Peta`s Pet
Devinder Sharma
New Delhi-based food and trade analyst
the issue is a part of the trends in global trade in totality. Western countries are trying to put obstacles in the name of sanitary and phytosanitary measures. They are trying to erect trade barriers in the name of environment and health. But in reality, the products exported from the North to the South are not only environmentally unsound but also rubbish. It is very shameful and unfortunate to project that the products from developing countries are environmentally unsafe.
There is nothing new in this case. They will go on creating these barriers in future also. In 1996, India imported one million tonnes of wheat from Australia after rejecting the offer from the us. This was done on the grounds of one of the clauses in Codex alimentaris which says that wheat should not have more than 0.003 per cent of downy mildew. The us wheat did not conform to the standards. Americans were obviously upset about it. They met the top brass in the Agriculture ministry and contested that no wheat in the world can meet those standards. They also pressurized India to import the wheat from the us as India had been importing the same standard wheat in the past also. One could see clearly how they maintain double standards when it comes to the environmental standards.
There are numerous examples of the hypocrisy they practice to maintain advantage in the global trade. For the last two years, the us is pushing hard to dump excessive produce of soyabean to India. us soyabean contains seven diseases and five pests, which is not found in India. We are also opposing this on the grounds that it may be genetically modified (gm) variety. We do not have the requisite technology or the laws in place to segregate normal and gm variety. But the us is lobbying hard to push through the deal. There are very strict environmental standards for the tropical fruits but the standards are very loose in the case of temperate fruits. That simply means India would be unable to export fruits to us.
Now, look at Germany. It banned carpets from India and Pakistan on the child labour issue. It is playing the same game with the cattle hide by boycotting Indian leather products in the garb of prevention of cruelty to animals. In reality, Germany is the biggest exporter of toxic wastes in the world. Germany should clean up its own house. They claim that handling of these hazardous waste will provide employment in the country like India. They would never accept these things in Germany. Isn’t this double standard? Germany, incidentally is also the biggest supplier of non-essential drugs (drugs that have outdated their utility). They do not allow these drugs to be sold inside their country but allow the companies to sell it elsewhere. India is one of the major recipients. In spite of Germany’s clear double standards, nobody challenges them. The western countries are not concerned about the environment. They are only concerned that their house remains clean.
As far as leather products are concerned, we are one of the major exporters of the world. They obviously are trying to hinder our trade. That the cattle from India or milk products from India are cause for a number of disease is completely unfounded. Everybody knows, all the major diseases and newer vectors have always come from the west. Look at aids, or any plant disease. We spend 55 per cent of our pesticide expenditure to control cotton bollworm, which actually has come from the us. So, the reasons behind this campaign to boycott Indian leather products in the name of environment are totally commercial and to keep the balance of global trade in the favour of the western countries. We should not have any misconception about that. We need to show them the mirror. Our government will have to fight for that. Leather and leather products are big foreign exchange earners for India. If we lose it, we will lose it forever.
RAJIV VORA
Activist and co-directior of Gandhi Peace Foundation
that we are not taking proper care of our animals is true, at least not as well as we should. But a campaign directed only against the animal products from India can only be run to unjustifiably malign our image. Compared to employment of a cruel technology and the demonic treatment that the animals receive in the west as a matter of normal, institutionalized and industrial practice, ill treatment of animals in India stands nowhere. Talking about slaughter houses, it is true that west has mastered the art of slaughtering. In India, slaughter has no social sanction.
No foreign agency should be allowed to influence our state policy, however pious or promising it may appear. peta, if it sees more cruelty in India than in the west, it must be having some particular agenda in mind. If a pot calls a kettle black