Previous Year Question

All three expressions mentioned in the question—the Agreement on Agriculture, SPS Agreement and Peace Clause—belong to the framework of the World Trade Organisation (WTO).

1. Agreement on Agriculture

The WTO’s Agreement on Agriculture—AoA entered into force with the establishment of the WTO on 1 January 1995. It seeks to establish a more market-oriented, transparent and rules-based agricultural trading system.

It is structured around three principal pillars:

• Market access: Converting quantitative restrictions on agricultural imports into tariffs and reducing tariffs according to scheduled commitments.

• Domestic support: Disciplining government subsidies that can affect agricultural production and trade.

• Export competition: Controlling agricultural export subsidies and measures having equivalent effects.

Domestic support is commonly classified as:

• Green Box: Support causing no or minimal trade distortion and generally exempt from reduction commitments.

• Amber Box: Trade- and production-distorting support associated with the Aggregate Measurement of Support—AMS.

• Blue Box: Support linked to programmes that limit production.

The de minimis threshold is generally 5% of the value of agricultural production for developed countries and 10% for developing countries.

2. SPS Agreement

The Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures—SPS Agreement concerns measures adopted to protect food safety and animal and plant health.

It allows countries to:

• Protect human life from contaminants or disease-causing organisms in food.

• Protect animals from diseases.

• Protect plants from pests and diseases.

Such measures must be based on scientific principles and must not be used as arbitrary or discriminatory restrictions on international trade.

The SPS Agreement recognises standards developed by:

• The Codex Alimentarius Commission for food safety.

• The World Organisation for Animal Health—WOAH for animal health.

• The International Plant Protection Convention—IPPC for plant health.

3. Peace Clause

Article 13 of the original Agreement on Agriculture contained a due-restraint or Peace Clause. Under specified circumstances, it temporarily protected qualifying agricultural subsidies from challenges under certain other WTO agreements.

Separately, the 2013 Bali Ministerial Conference adopted an interim Peace Clause for developing countries’ public stockholding programmes for food security.

Under this arrangement, WTO members refrain from challenging an existing public-stockholding programme merely because the country’s support exceeds its prescribed AMS limit, provided that the country complies with specified transparency and notification requirements.

For India, this is relevant to foodgrain procurement at MSP and the holding of food stocks for distribution under the National Food Security Act.

Thus, all three terms are associated with the WTO. The answer is (c).

Current position (2026)

WTO negotiations on a permanent solution for public stockholding for food security remain unresolved. Until a permanent solution is reached, protection under the interim Peace Clause adopted through the Bali and subsequent WTO decisions continues, subject to compliance with the prescribed notification and transparency conditions.

India invoked the Peace Clause for the first time in 2020, notifying the WTO that its product-specific support for rice had exceeded the applicable de minimis limit.