The farm trade negotiations, being carried out as part of the GATT-sponsored Uruguay Round of multilateral trade liberalization talks, would end up in failure. Farm produce is quite different from manufactured goods. The proposed package lumps them together. Ample consideration should be given to the positions of importing nations and industrially developing countries. As for Japan, a national consensus is yet to be reached over the decontrol on farm produce-especially rice-imports. That's an important factor. Agriculture is not a mere sector of industry: It serves to protect the environment, maintain cultural tradition and support regional economy.
If exporting countries are glutted with farm produce, they should convert part of it from foodstuffs to materials for use in pharmaceutical, biotechnology and other industries. In this way, they will be able to find expanded outlets for agricultural products.
Should Japan accept the across-the-board tariffication proposal, some portion of the funds for the so-called official development aid to developing countries should be used. Needless to say, the government must protect the health of the people from the harm of post-harvest chemicals by checking farm produce imports in accordance with the standards for the level of agricultural chemicals residues.
To help farmers curtail the costs of farming, the following measures should be taken:
(1) Encouragement of large-scale farming through the farmland banking system of the agricultural cooperatives;
(2) Promotion of farmland improvement with funds provided by the national and local governments;
(3) Long-term, low-interest financing instead of the provision of subsidies thatserves only to increase debts;
(4) Utilization of robots and light aircraft;
(5) Lowering of input goods prices; and
(6) Introduction of CATV and other means of information and overseas news service.