The US posed a salvo of questions to India on its domestic support programmes, including its cotton policies, minimum support price, public stockholding for food security purposes and landholding pooling by Indian farmers, in a meeting at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) here.
The US asked India ‘whether state bonus or other state- level funding is included in the notification by India under public stockholding for food security purposes’ in a Committee of Agricultural regular session meeting.
India had notified $13,812.46 in the period 2010-2011 for public stockholding. These questions were posed at a regular session meeting of the Committee of Agriculture held on Thursday which debates the farm policies of member states.
Additionally, the US questioned the factors which required raising of Minimum Support Price (MSP) of cotton when there was reduced import demand in China and falling world cotton prices.
The US also asked India to delineate “what factors [apart from landholding size] contributed to India's assessment that two hectares was an appropriate basis for determining which farmers received debt waivers versus debt relief.”