Govt urged to slap anti-dumping duties on US cotton imports

05 Oct '05

2 min read

Convinced that cotton glut and subsequent import of US cotton would harm the interests of local producers, Minister for Marketing, Government of Maharashtra, Harshvardhan Patil informed media on Monday that Chief Minister, Vilasrao Deshmukh, will appraise the Commerce Minister Kamal Nath about the issue.

Citing the case of US Government, which has been doling huge subsidies to US farmers dump in turn helping dump cotton in to India, he called for raising the import duty on cotton from 10 percent to 50 percent.

Patil also sought special subsidy for Maharashtra cotton farmers from the Union Government so that state farmers could withstand international competition.

Maharashtra accounted for 45 lakh bales of the total 75 lakh bales of cotton production in the country this year while the domestic cotton consumption reached 55 lakh bales.

Currently, excess stocks has led to slump in cotton prices, and further compounded by monopoly procurement scheme for cotton has left the State Government facing uphill task of liquidating 18 lakh bales (170 kg a bale) from its inventories.

The Minister forecast that with a bumper crop ahead this season, cotton production is likely to reach 250-300 lakh quintals in 2005-06, a 30 percent rise in production, as farmers have gone for Bt cotton in a big way.

Industry expert meanwhile suggested that India may approach Dispute Settlement Board at World Trade Oranization for seeking applying anti-dumping duties on US cotton by proving that it has affected Indian market and attracted losses for Indian cotton growers.

However, India having imported eight lakh cotton bales from the international market, and exported about 10 lakh bales during 2004-05, thus acquiring big exporter status, will prove its unmaking at WTO, he added.

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