Wed, May 22, 2002 page19

• Japan's farming roots run deep

  There is little hope that Japan will end its practice of protecting the agricultural sector, as the government implements a scheme to raise its food self-sufficiency ratio from 40 percent to 45 percent

  • AP
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  When a tornado swept through this farming community north of Tokyo four years ago, ripping part of the roof off Fujie Nozawa's wooden leek stall, she just repaired the roof and got back to work.

  Her tiny leek patch has been at the center of another storm recently -- a trade war with China over vegetable imports. She's just as adamant now about holding her ground.

  "We'll never give up," said the 71-year-old farmer. "Japan's tradition is cultivating vegetables. We live by the veggies we grow, and we have to protect that."

  Japan made a last-minute decision in December not to renew import restrictions on Chinese leeks, shiitake mushrooms and rushes for tatami mats after Beijing slapped 100 percent tariffs on Japanese cars.

  But experts say the government is likely to set up even more safeguards against cheap farm imports in the future.

  "We're seeing a double blow," said Mamoru Nagano, senior economist at Mitsubishi Research Institute. "Japan is erecting barriers and there's low demand for products that do come into Japan from Asia."

  Japan is famously protectionist when it comes to farmers, imposing high tariffs on everything from rice, Japan's staple food, to golden delicious apples.

  That tendency to coddle is seen as the biggest obstacle to Japan's hopes of creating Free Trade Agreements (FTA) with Asian nations.

  "There are many drawbacks and few merits for us to include agriculture in FTAs," said Tatsuya Kajishima, an international trade official at the Agriculture Ministry.

  Even as more farmers desert their plots for the cities, the government has enacted a plan to raise Japan's food self-sufficiency rate from 40 percent to 45 percent, a goal that will almost certainly lead to stronger import barriers.

  In Geneva, home to the World Trade Organization, "people say we have an agriculture fixation," said Trade Ministry official Shintaro Watanabe.

  Hisao Nozawa, who helps Fujie Nozawa sell leeks, voiced the emotional chord farming strikes in Japan, where farmers were the second-highest social class after samurai during the feudal age.

  "Japanese people should eat Japanese veggies. That's all we Japanese are good at, cultivating vegetables," said Nozawa, no relation to her boss.

  Other farmers in Fukaya, a town so famous for its produce that people advise outsiders to keep their car windows closed "because it reeks of leeks," said they feel threatened by Chinese imports.

  Many claim deflation has gotten so bad that supermarkets are resorting to fraud to keep prices down: Mixing cheap Chinese leeks with domestic ones and passing them off as 100 percent homegrown.

  "We're worried about our future," said 67-year-old Kikue Kogure, who started farming a decade ago after her husband was forced out of his job. "The big villain is free trade."

  Critics of Japan's trade policy say political pressure on Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's Liberal Democratic Party will close Japan's agriculture market even more.

  "We're going to see more safeguards," said John Ward, secretary of the agriculture committee at the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan. "The agriculture lobby is strong in the LDP. If farmers scream and shout, they'll say they'll see what they can do."
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