WTO Disciplines on Export Credit Support for Agricultural Products in the Wake of the US - Cotton Case and the Doha Round Negotiations

This contribution offers an overview of the current as well as potential future obligations on export credit support for agricultural products under the Agreement on Agriculture and the SCM Agreement. The US – Upland Cotton rulings have not only shown that such disciplines are actually in place, yet they are also in line with – and even go beyond - the obligations imposed on direct export subsidies for agricultural products. Even negotiators seemed surprised by this jurisprudence as they were unintentionally drafting more flexible rules instead of more rigid ones on export credit support for agricultural products in the Doha Round. This contribution explains that the latest draft on the table would, however, impose additional disciplines that are clearly stricter than those imposed on direct export subsidies but, at the same time, fails to equalize the level playing field among WTO Members and is hard to read in a coherent way