WTO農業協定下の農村社会・地域資源保全

日本型デカップリング政策の展開方位

抄録

　This paper aims to search the direction of Japanese agricultural policy orientating toward the next WTO agricultural negotiations and the New Food/Agriculture/Rural Basic Law structuring, as clarifying characteristics of agricultural policy in developed countries.
　The following points can be pointed out when we try to characterize the agricultural policies in developed countries under WTO. The first fact is having reduced agricultural budgets. The second is having shifted the weight of measures to "decoupled" direct income payments that have no, or at most minimal, trade-distorting effects or effects on production. The third is having converted policy to paying consideration to both resource conservation and the maintenance of rural communities.
　Japanese agriculture, too, cannot evade the current trend of international policy in the future. Japanese agricultural policy canvasses the contents of agricultural public works and needs to enrich the direct income payments. It is necessary for Japanese agricultural policy to establish the same minimum price guarantee system as the U.S. and EU. In short, it is important that Japanese agricultural policy should aim to maintain a reasonable livelihood for farmers and resource conservators.