The Hindu : National : UNCTAD suggests steps to help tsunami-hit countries

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Jan 24, 2005

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UNCTAD suggests steps to help tsunami-hit countries

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, JAN. 23. In order to facilitate faster socio-economic recovery of tsunami-hit countries, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) has called for a series of immediate trade measures by the global community, including the suspension of anti-dumping actions against products from the affected countries.

Duty-free treatment

Significantly, the UNCTAD has also favoured temporary provision of duty-free treatment to imports from tsunami-hit countries in line with WTO rules. An immediate suspension or termination of all special trade restraining measures, such as anti-dumping stepsmeasures on goods like seafood and processed agricultural products, has also been suggested.

According to another official release, UNCTAD has also recommended steps to strengthen capacities of the affected developing countries, the relaxation of market access for service providers to help generate additional foreign exchange, special measures to revive the tourism industry and infrastructure and actions to support the rebuilding of trade logistics.

The world body also suggested that medium and long-term trade measures in favour of the affected countries should be addressed in the context of ongoing multilateral trade negotiations under the Doha Work Programme.

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