WORLD TRADE
ORGANIZATIONG/AG/NG/W/46
5 October 2000
(00-4072)
Committee on Agriculture
Special SessionOriginal:  English
THIRD SPECIAL SESSION OF THE COMMITTEE ON AGRICULTURE
28-29 SEPTEMBER 2000
Statement by Japan
Comments by Japan on the Negotiation Proposals
Japan is now proceeding with the domestic process in view of submitting its comprehensive
negotiation proposal by the end of the year.  The proposal will cover individual issues, such as marketaccess, domestic support and export competition, and will duly take into account non-trade concerns,
including food security and the multifunctional character of agriculture.
Today, I would like to make some preliminar y comments on the issues relating to the
negotiation proposals that have been submitted to this session.
Domestic Support
First, to ensure a coexistence of the various types of agriculture in each country in view of
their different climate and land conditions, a certain level of domestic support is indispensable.  The
commitment level of domestic support should be a realistic one, in conformity with the state of
progress of the agricultural policy reform in each country.
Second, to ensure a smooth progress of policy reform in each country, we should maintain the
current basic framework of the "green", "blue" and "amber" boxes.  In particular, we should properly
evaluate the importance of the "blue" box as an intermediary stage of policy conversion from "amber"
to "green".  In this respect, Japan strongly supports the EU's proposal on the "blue" box policy.
Third, considering the experience gained from implementing the UR Agreement, the "green"
policy needs to be revised in order to enable it to respond flexibly to the various concerns of each
country.
Fourth, various non-trade concerns such as food security and multifunctional role of
agriculture are an important subject to both developing and developed countries.  The rules on
agricultural trade we will make must be able to respond to these concerns in a proper way.
Market Access
We need some specific and detailed consideration on each product, taking into account:
(i) the various natural and geographical conditions in each country;  (ii) the historical background
from past trade negotiations;  and (iii) the experience gained from implementing the UR Agreement,
as well as paying due consideration to the co-existence of various types of agriculture.G/AG/NG/W/46
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Export Competition
In strengthening the rules and disciplines on export measures, we need to make a
comprehensive examination, covering not only expo rt subsidies, but also all the other export
measures, including export restrictions, export tax and export state trading.
In particular, the current rules and disciplines on export state trading are not so strict as those
on import state trading.  It is, therefore, necessary to strengthen the rules on export state trading in
order to improve its transparency and predictability.
At the same time, I would like to stress that we should not discourage the efforts made
towards promoting global food security or humane food aid through the WTO rules.
Comments by Japan on the Background Papers of the Secretariat
First, we would like to express our appreciation to  the Secretariat for its efforts in preparing a
number of background papers.  And we are looking for having the remaining papers, which were
agreed at the meeting in June.
According to the paper G/AG/NG/S/11/Add.2, the va lue of exports for agricultural products
from developing countries increased in the late 90s, along with the overall growth of worldagricultural trade.  However, the actual participation by developing countries in world agricultural
trade has barely changed with only the Latin America region having substantially increased its
presence in international agricultural market.
In addition, as a result of our analysis on world agricultural trade since the mid- 80s, we can
observe two trends.  First, a polarisation of agricultural trade has become more apparent over the last
25 years between the export-depending countries in North America and Oceania, and the import-
depending countries in Asia.  Second, an aggravation of the trade balance among agricultural products
in developing countries, especially in Asia and Africa, has become more noticeable.  Only exception
is Latin America.
This point is also reflected in paper G/AG/NG/S/11/Add.1 whereby it is observed that among
the 121 countries listed in the tables, 52 of them increased their net agricultural exports during the
period from the early 90s (1991-1994) to the late 90s (1995-1998).  At the same time, however, the
net exports of ever more countries, i.e. 68, decreased over the same period.
We can further note that while 25 of the 30 largest net-exporting countries increased their net
exports, only 6 of the 30 largest net-importing countries improved their trade balance on agricultural
products.  The tables demonstrate the progress of polarisation in agricultural trade.  In particular, each
of the 10 largest net-exporting countries increased their net exports substantially, 6 of them being
countries located in the New World.  I would just like to add that, for 28 out of the 47 Net Food-
Importing Developing Countries (NFIDC), the trade balance on agricultural products worsened over
the same period and only 19 NFIDCs actually improved their agricultural trade balance.
All these experiences suggest that only the large net-exporting countries have benefited from
the market access improvement under the Uruguay Round, i.e. all developed countries and a small
number of relatively wealthy developing countries which have a particular advantage in their naturalconditions, mainly located in the New World.  We can note that many of developing countries that are
in utmost need of economic development suffer from  the insufficiency of foreign currency as imports
of agricultural products increase.G/AG/NG/W/46
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The above observations concern the overall trends in world agricultural trade.  Of course,
when discussing the desirable future of the agricultural trading system, we should study in more detail
the individual situation of each country due to the wide variety of products traded and the varying
situations concerning agriculture.
In a situation where improving market access does not necessarily lead to an increase in the
exports of many developing countries and only a few countries reap the benefits of such trade
liberalisation, we can hardly say that economic development of developing countries will be achieved
through only the improvement of market access.  For many developing countries striving to alleviate
poverty, the improvement of the various infrastructures for sustainable agricultural production is of
utmost importance.  We must pay utmost attention to this point during the negotiations on agriculture,
and we should establish international rules permit ting co-existence and enabling the development of
agriculture in each country.
Finally, I would just like to add, as pointed out in the Secretariat's paper, that Japan is the
largest net importer of agricultural products, importing more than 10 per cent of the total exports of
agricultural products in the world, including developing countries.
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