Last year was a bad one for free trade. The Doha Round was supposed to make agriculture the centerpiece of negotiations to assuage the deep frustrations of developing countries. But instead of breathing life into free trade in food, rural protectionism in rich countries seems to have killed the Doha Round -- and, with it, potentially the whole multilateral trading regime.
Agriculture has always presented the greatest challenge to free-trade doctrine and its promise of empowering the poor, for it is one of the most distorted areas of global trade. In 2004, OECD countries spent more than four times their official development aid budgets on support for domestic farmers. In 2000, the World Bank estimated that OECD agricultural protectionism cost the developing world US$20 billion in welfare losses annually. Most galling, agriculture is a small and declining part of these "rich club" economies, and the richer and larger they are, the less significant agriculture is and the more resources are wasted on rural welfare.
The practical challenge comes from agriculture's two advantages that insulate the rural sector from global market forces and turn even the most urbane, liberal politicians into its defenders. First, farming is geographically concentrated and farmers vote on agricultural policy above everything else, greatly enhancing the power of their votes -- something that few, if any, urban consumers do.
Second, protectionists have developed populist but logically questionable arguments that agricultural staples cannot be treated as tradable commodities subject to competition. Domestic farmers are portrayed as irreplaceable defenders of the social fabric and traditional values. On top of this, farming is presented as analogous to the military. Just as no government should outsource national security to untrustworthy foreigners, nor should any government permit the national food supply to rely on the supposed vagaries of foreign production.
We accept paying a high and inefficient cost for national defense against what are often unknown enemies. Agricultural protectionists, through the language of food security and food self-sufficiency, claim that the same holds true for food.
Japan has long been the paragon of rich-country agricultural protectionism. Its electoral system heavily favors rural voters. Farmers are well organized politically, and the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries (MAFF) has been a fierce defender of agricultural protectionism. Food security arguments resonate well in Japan, owing to memories of shortages during World War II and its aftermath.
Ironically, Japan now offers a seed of hope for agricultural liberalization. The country's declining number of voters are lining up in favor of cheaper, imported food. Japan's demographic crisis is particularly acute in rural areas, where the average age of farmers is surpassing the retirement age. One enterprising village recently sold itself entirely to a waste disposal firm after it could no longer find any young people willing to return to bucolic bliss.
Despite decades of government support, the rural sector cannot aspire to feed its declining population. Food self-sufficiency in staple cereals now stands at 28 percent on a calorie supply basis, with no signs of growth. Farming, fishing, and forestry now account for less than 2 percent of the total economy and less than 4 percent of the workforce.
The rapid aging and decline of Japan's rural population is fundamentally shifting Japan's approach to food. The MAFF is wistfully abandoning the cherished goal of food autarky. Its latest strategic plan calls for a self-sufficiency ratio of 45 percent by 2015 and focuses instead on "securing the stability of food imports" through diversification and free-trade agreements. For decades, the MAFF's power meant that Japan's trading partners would not even contemplate free-trade discussions. Now the Japanese government, supporting the reformers at the MAFF, is using free-trade deals and negotiations with competitive exporters like Thailand and Australia to pursue agricultural consolidation.
Even more galling for the MAFF's traditionalists, their food security argument is being turned on its head. Leveraging Japan's inability to feed itself, trade negotiators now argue that Japan needs to open up to imports or face being shut out of global food markets by fast-growing giants like China. Deepening these fears, China's free-trade deals in Southeast Asia give agriculture priority. While the logic of this argument is shaky, it taps into deep Japanese concerns about China's rise.
The rich countries face a similar demographic challenge, while the rest of the world waits to see how their responses will reshape the global economy. Japan, due to its advanced demographic decline, is the bellwether, yet other traditional rural protectionists like France and South Korea are not far behind. France now has half the number of farmers it had 20 years ago.
That is good news for farmers and consumers around the world. Rich and aging countries may finally become promoters, rather than opponents, of free trade in food.
Malcolm Cook is a program director at the Lowy Institute for International Policy in Sydney, Australia. Copyright: Project Syndicate
Saudi Arabian largesse is flooding Egypt’s cultural scene, but the reception is mixed. Some welcome new “cooperation” between two regional powerhouses, while others fear a hostile takeover by Riyadh. In Cairo, historically the cultural capital of the Arab world, Egyptian Minister of Culture Nevine al-Kilany recently hosted Saudi Arabian General Entertainment Authority chairman Turki al-Sheikh. The deep-pocketed al-Sheikh has emerged as a Medici-like patron for Egypt’s cultural elite, courted by Cairo’s top talent to produce a slew of forthcoming films. A new three-way agreement between al-Sheikh, Kilany and United Media Services — a multi-media conglomerate linked to state intelligence that owns much of
The US and other countries should take concrete steps to confront the threats from Beijing to avoid war, US Representative Mario Diaz-Balart said in an interview with Voice of America on March 13. The US should use “every diplomatic economic tool at our disposal to treat China as what it is... to avoid war,” Diaz-Balart said. Giving an example of what the US could do, he said that it has to be more aggressive in its military sales to Taiwan. Actions by cross-party US lawmakers in the past few years such as meeting with Taiwanese officials in Washington and Taipei, and
Denmark’s “one China” policy more and more resembles Beijing’s “one China” principle. At least, this is how things appear. In recent interactions with the Danish state, such as applying for residency permits, a Taiwanese’s nationality would be listed as “China.” That designation occurs for a Taiwanese student coming to Denmark or a Danish citizen arriving in Denmark with, for example, their Taiwanese partner. Details of this were published on Sunday in an article in the Danish daily Berlingske written by Alexander Sjoberg and Tobias Reinwald. The pretext for this new practice is that Denmark does not recognize Taiwan as a state under
The Republic of China (ROC) on Taiwan has no official diplomatic allies in the EU. With the exception of the Vatican, it has no official allies in Europe at all. This does not prevent the ROC — Taiwan — from having close relations with EU member states and other European countries. The exact nature of the relationship does bear revisiting, if only to clarify what is a very complicated and sensitive idea, the details of which leave considerable room for misunderstanding, misrepresentation and disagreement. Only this week, President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) received members of the European Parliament’s Delegation for Relations