India to link BPO with restarting WTO talks

The Times of India ^ | February 16, 2004 | PRIYA RANJAN DASH

[sarcasm]

NEW DELHI : India is expected to tell US trade representative Robert Zoellick that restrictions being put up in the BPO market, which has always been open, do not auger well for resumption of the WTO talks.

Zoellick has toured Japan , China , South-East Asia and will visit key African countries after his India trip.

This is in follow-up to his January 12 letter to all 146 WTO member-countries, urging a quick resumption of the talks to meet the deadline for reaching a new deal at the end of the year.

"2004 should not be a lost year," Zoellick said. As presidential poll would be held in the US later this year, he wrote, the Bush government would not impact upon the administration's efforts to make progress in WTO.

But the polls are surely influencing the BPO policy. Or that is what India Inc believes is evident from recent events such as the US Senate passing a Bill banning outsourcing of government contracts to countries like India and president Bush's economic adviser retracting a statement backing BPO.

Bush last week chose to dump the head of his council of economic advisers Gregory Mankiw, who was made to tender an unusual public apology for defending BPO as in "long term US economic interest" after Democrats and Republicans on the campaign trail came down heavily on the Harvard professor.

Earlier, Bush's economic report had been emphatic in its support for outsourcing in which a US company procures labour-intensive services from countries like India where they can be rendered at a fraction of the cost.

[sarcasm]

ping

[Lael]

Bush last week chose to dump the head of his council of economic advisers Gregory Mankiw, who was made to tender an unusual public apology for defending BPO as in "long term US economic interest" after Democrats and Republicans on the campaign trail came down heavily on the Harvard professor.

When did Bush "dump" Mankiw???????????

And if he did, why are we reading this in an Indian newspaper???????

Reminds me of the good ole' days of Shortwave...if it didn't come in over the 'long wire', it wasn't worth a D*MN!!!