When you attend these IFAJ conventions it’s interesting to hear from the policy leaders on the program. I’ve found that it’s very normal to have someone on the program to defend policy practices, especially when it comes to foreign trade and the WTO.

This was certainly the case here when we heard from Nobuhiro Suzuki, Department of Global Agricultural Sciences, University of Tokyo. He gave a presentation on “The Myths and Reality of Japanese Agricultural Policy.” I can only conclude that he did a study to try and portray Japan’s need to be exempted from some of the rules. I think he lost us when he got to price supports. For example, he was comparing various countries but pulled Japan’s rice and dairy products out of their numbers. Those just happen to be the main ones they support. That totally distorted the comparisons and at that point I had difficulty putting credence in his conclusions. He also spent a lot of time on what he called “food miles,” “virtual water” and some sort of formula with nitrogen capacity in farm land. That lost me. The bottom line I got out of it was that he claims that most of what the rest of the world believes about Japanese farm policy is wrong and that in the interests of national security they can’t make changes that are called for in the WTO in regards to eliminating price supports in the near future.

IFAJ Congress 2007 Photo Album

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