18-05-2025
Two-day conference on ‘Public policy in India and the Global South' held in Thiruvananthapuram
International trade continues to be skewed heavily in favour of the wealthy Global North countries, despite the fact that the Global South, which includes India, supplies 90% of the labour force, Kerala Statistical Commission chairman P.C. Mohanan has said.
Mr. Mohanan was speaking at a two-day national conference on 'Public policy in India and the Global South' organised here by the Public Policy Research Institute (PPRI). Despite accounting for the major chunk of the world's labour force, developing nations receive only 21% of the wealth generated. Wages in the Global South countries are not even 10% of that in the wealthier nations, Mr. Mohanan said.
US President Donald Trump's economic policies will adversely impact the World Trade Organisation, State Finance Commission chairman K.N. Harilal said. It is the wealthier nations that impose higher import duties on agricultural products, Sachin Kumar Sharma of the Indian Institute of Foreign Trade, said. While an Indian farmer receives $429-worth of subsidies a year, a farmer in the US gets $90,375, he said.
PPRI director Mohanakumar S. inaugurated the two-day event. Researchers from leading institutes including the Indian Institutes of Technology and the Indian Institutes of Management and universities presented papers at the conference.
