ery products were banned by EU and were put on automatic detention by the US (Scheuplein, 1999). There were numer­ous detentions in 2000-2001under the SPS provisions.
     Cases of SPS restrictions on Indian food exports subse­quently have included:
•   UAE ban on Indian meat imports (for 10 companies) due to health and hygiene reasons;
•     EU ban on Indian fish imports due to lack of SPS stan­dards especially in canning (only 90 out of 404 plants approved for fishery exports to the EU);
•     Fruit flies in fresh fruits and vegetables necessitating treatment before exportation: e.g., mango (stone wee­vil) to Australia; mango, citrus and flowers to Japan; and grapes to China;
•     Groundnut and spices (EU, Italy and Germany) and Chilies (Spain) due to aflatoxin and chemical residues;
•     India was delisted from the list of approved countries in EU for import of egg powders, two years ago, for non-submission of Residue Monitoring Plan (RMP);
•     Dairy products export problems include mastitis in bo-vines and foot and mouth disease in cattle and buffalo; Somatic Cell Count (SCC) based pricing in first world; and input sector related problems like quality of fodder which affect milk quality.
•     "Karnal bunt" in wheat and Iran's rejection of Indian wheat sent by two private exporters due to quality problem; and
•     Forty Indian basmati rice consignments detained in 1999-2000 by the USFDA because of filth and pesticide residue.
•     Under the WTO agreement, India had obligated itself to comply with the SPS provisions by the end of 1997. In the food sector, this includes strengthening of the na­tional food export control system.

A study of quality control and monitoring practices in two of the commodity sectors in India (fisheries and spices) found that there were serious problems of maintenance of hygiene and quality standards and processes at the primary production or procurement level. For example, the fishing boats did not have ice on their streams when they arrived at the pier. The appearance of the boats was dirty and it did not seem possible under those conditions that they complied with hygiene standards. When fish and shrimp were unload­ed from the boats, they were dumped into piles sometimes
Table 3-3. Maximum Residue Limit (MRL) under Codex and PFA for milk/milk products.

Source: Chawla and Kumar, 1997.

very carelessly and in an unorganized manner. There was no separation of fish from the general walking areas and every one appeared to have free access to any place on the pier or any pile of fish. On the other hand, the processing centers were excellent at maintaining quality and hygiene standards and they had HACCP in place and in operation. But this may not be the case with all the 400 processing facilities in India. Most of the quality and hygiene problems at the primary produce level were due to lack of awareness and lack of infrastructure like potable water and landing facili­ties. Similarly, in spice production and processing, the major problems were in production which is carried out by small-scale farmers who lack knowledge of quality and hygiene and do not have an incentive to maintain them. Here too, the processing plants had all the quality systems in place, but the contamination takes place at the farmer and the trader level (Scheuplein, 1999).

Options. At the international level, there is a need to make the WTO system more transparent. The farmers' organiza­tions should be allowed to participate, either through their governments or directly, into the standard setting bodies like the CAC so that farmer concerns could be brought into the body and its rules and recommendations.
     Further, since domestic markets do not value quality, the farmer is not encouraged to maintain high quality standards of the produce. Therefore, what is required is not end-prod­uct testing for exports but monitoring of the entire com­modity chain to maintain quality and hygiene standards. It is here that the application of HACCP comes in as a process control concept which places the burden of ensuring safety on the members of the food chain which include farmers, traders, processors and distributors. There is a serious need to link farmers with processing and exporting agencies and firms so that quality can be ensured right from the raw ma­terial production stage. This can be achieved through ap­propriately designed arrangements like contract farming or the procurement cooperative alignment with processing and marketing companies.

3.2.5     Anti-dumping measures and AKST
After the removal of all other non-tariff barriers under the WTO regime, the anti-dumping measures are the most im­portant non-tariff barriers as they are being used as a pro­tectionist measure with little connection with dumping or fair trade. The anti-dumping disputes (15.4% of total) were next only to import restrictions (on goods) related disputes (38.4% of total) brought to the WTO during 1995-2003 (Rameshan, 2004). It is not the use of the anti-dumping measures but their very existence that can have significant trade effects like collusive behavior among domestic and foreign firms (Zanardi, 2004). This is already evident in the fact that in the recent past, there has been a steady in­crease in the number of anti-dumping actions by both the developed and the developing countries. The exporters in many developing countries find that, as their exports rise, there are increasing pressures from developed country in­dustries for the levy of anti-dumping duties on the ground that goods are being dumped. Thus, anti-dumping measures might counter balance the tariff reductions accomplished by various GATT rounds.