Union Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal has said that the outcome of the 13th ministerial conference of the WTO was “good” and India is “completely satisfied” as the country continues to retain its full policy space to protect the interests of farmers and fishermen in every respect.

“India continues to retain full policy space for the benefit of our farmers, our fishermen, and in every respect, we have been able to take India’s interests to the highest level possible,” Goyal said after the five-day meeting of the trade ministers of 166-member World Trade Organisation (WTO).

“Generally through the MC13, progress was made on several contentious issues which had not been closed for many years. Forward movement is always a sign of a possible closure going forward,” he said.

Goyal added that in the proposed fisheries subsidies agreement aimed to curb subsidies that lead to over capacity and over fishing, India found several ambiguities on the proposals that were on the table.

“By and large, the objectives with which we had come to Abu Dhabi are largely met and we go back fully satisfied,” the Minister said, adding, “our largest interest was to protect our farmers and our fishermen, both of which we are strongly doing and that is our offensive interest which we are actively pursuing.” On further extension of the duty moratorium on e-commerce trade, Goyal said that India was “not necessarily opposed” to it fully.

As the members were not able to reach a consensus on key issues such as agriculture and fisheries subsidies, the talks that were scheduled to end on February 29 got extended for a day. The talks at the WTO’s ministerial conference ended with no decision on issues such as finding a permanent solution to public food stockpile and curbing fisheries subsidies, but the members agreed to further extend the moratorium on imposing import duties on e-commerce trade for two more years.