Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2011-05-09-Speech-1-131-000"
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"en.20110509.20.1-131-000"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner, ladies and gentlemen, the EU-India free trade agreement negotiations are ambitious, they concern many economic sectors, but they are also a cause for concern in Europe and in India, as I was able to see during last month’s meeting between the trade committee of the two chambers of the Indian Parliament and the European Parliament’s delegation for relations with India.
India is booming; it is a strategic partner, as you have reminded us. Everyone understands the importance of developing trade between us. Yet we are not starting from scratch, since the Union is already India’s main trading partner, the main investor in India and the main destination for Indian investors, and India is also the main beneficiary of the system of generalised preferences.
We will therefore have to be alert to any new impact that a new and more far-reaching trade agreement may have on fragile sectors of the Indian economy. I am thinking, for example, of agriculture – our Indian colleagues spoke to us about this – and of the consequences for sectors that are particularly exposed to competition from emerging countries in Europe, and I am thinking of the car industry. Such an agreement should serve the development of our societies and of employment and not give rise to uncontrolled liberalisation that would have disastrous effects.
That is why my group wishes to emphasise a number of points in these negotiations, which should culminate in an agreement that helps achieve the objectives of sustainable development and poverty eradication, and which should also be accompanied by clear and verifiable commitments, on the basis of cooperation, of course, but then coupled with serious social and environmental commitments.
I should like to emphasise a few points in particular. Firstly, regarding agriculture – which I mentioned earlier – we call on the Commission to ensure that none of the agreement’s provisions, either on the liberalisation of agricultural trade or on intellectual property rights, threaten small-scale farming in India. I am thinking of the provisions on seeds, for example.
Secondly, regarding generic medicines, India is the biggest producer of generic medicines in the developing world. We call on the Commission to stop demanding data exclusivity, since all the NGOs say it is liable to harm the distribution of those medicines.
Thirdly, in the area of services, we call, firstly, for public services to be left out of the sectors to be liberalised and, secondly, concerning mode IV, for the principle of equal treatment to be guaranteed – in other words, for all forms of social dumping to be rejected.
Lastly – thank you, Mr President – we believe that the sustainable development chapter must include binding commitments in relation to respect for social and environmental standards, in particular, ILO social standards."@en1
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