The government said on Wednesday that it would not give greater market access to agri-products of developed countries unless they cut down on their domestic and export subsidies.
It warned that developing countries might also increase their import tariffs if the developed countries continued with their huge subsidies.
"Unabated subsidies by major developed countries leave developing countries with the sole recourse of using tariff related measures to protect their farmers from adverse consequences of trade distortion," Agriculture Minister Rajnath Singh said in New Delhi.
Having returned from Rome where he attended Food and Agriculture Organisation conference, the minister said unfairly gained competitiveness through subsidies and unjustified protection in developed countries had seriously disadvantaged the developing countries.
He said the issues of domestic support, export subsidies and market access were interlinked; unless the developed world fell in line on the first two, India would not seek any compromise on the third.
Advanced developed world economies must not be allowed to undermine the livelihood security of farmers in developing countries under the guise of self-serving trade reforms.
Singh had participated in the FAO conference on Global Food Security in Rome and attended a round-table discussion on matters related to the World Trade Organisation. He also held bilateral discussions with European Agriculture Commissioner and his counterparts from Japan, Sweden and Finland.
