摘要
Japan is one of the world's largest importer of food, and its food self-sufficiency rate has kept decreasing in the last 50 years. However, the Japanese government has always been extremely cautious about opening its agricultural market, since it has the world's highest imports tariffs on several kinds of farm products. Dr. Assmann (2015) mentioned in her article "Agriculture in Japan, Free trade and the need for reform" that, many factors are hindering the trade liberalization of Japanese agricultural products. At first, inside the government exist contradictions between the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF) and other economic sectors. Then grassroots also actively participate in protests led by JA-Zenchu, the central union of Zen-Noh which ranks the nation's biggest farmers' union. Besides, the gaiatsu from other countries and international organizations leads the Japanese government to be in a dilemma between substantial economic benefits and a probable sacrifice of domestic farmers. In the second half of the article, Assmann (2015) introduced that, the Japanese government has been attempting to reform the agricultural sector to reconcile such contradictions between external and internal factors. However, at the same time, the MAFF also raised many campaigns to oppose trade liberalization, since it tended to oppose free trade agreements (FTAs) and pursued an "inward-looking policy"(p.59) such as keep high tariffs, promoting indigenous food fare and so on. However, influences of most of the attempts seem to be modest. Assmann (2015) pointed out that the Basic Policy and Action Plan for the Revitalization of Japan's Food, Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries (hereafter called as the Basic Plan)(MAFF, 2011) made by the Democratic-led government in 2011 remain on paper and reforms still face stagnation. So in the following part, I will share some of my thoughts on this plan and analyze its difficult part, and then propose some new ideas.
