The recent global "food crisis" and subsequent market fluctuations have revealed clearly the significant role played by a handful transnational agribusiness corporations not just in the grain trading sector as happened in 1970s, but also in agricultural input sectors in a way that these corporations have reaped enormous profits at the expense of farmers worldwide. This is possible because of an undue exercise of their oligopolistic influence on the agricultural input market. Their influence is also exerted through providing farmers with farming technology, information and services packaged in agricultural input products. Under the global restructuring of agriculture and food systems, transnational agribusiness corporations are developing strategies to deal with rapidly changing market conditions: market expansion in emerging economies and market saturation in developed ones, while growing public concerns about adverse effects of some of agricultural input products on the environment, human health, and rural communities. This paper describes the outlook of the global agricultural input industries, and elaborates on the global strategies of transnational agribusiness corporations. Although these will be done separately by industry sector since each has its own characteristics, the paper will conclude with a short summary of common features identified across the industries.

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This paper focuses on the present and future of the seed market in South Korea, considering the current state of nursery companies. The seed industry has a strong relation with gardening production, which has been increasing with economic development in South Korea. Therefore, expectations for continued development for the seed industry were high. But corporate consolidation by virtue of multinational corporate trading in South Korea started from 1997, with exports of fresh vegetables starting at the same time. With the imports of fresh vegetable seeds from Japan, the South Korean seed market was drastically affected. This analysis reveals that the circulation of seedlings has changed from the seed to the seedling, with the main point of circulation being a seedling center. However, the seedling center is new organization, which has no relation with the nursery company. Finally, there is high competition between seedling centers resulting in active seedling export to Japan.

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The appropriate use of organic waste (raw garbage, livestock excreta) is an increasingly important issue. These organic wastes are used as agricultural material such as fodder and fertilizers. This paper clarifies the relationship between the venous industry and the agricultural materials market. In this paper, the following points were clarified. Firstly, the supply of organic waste is unstable. So, when organic waste is used in the agricultural materials market, it is necessary to recognize that this instability is a precondition. Secondarily, agricultural cooperatives are important as actors in the venous industry in their regions.

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Agriculture does not presently exist without use of the plastic materials. According to the Waste Management and Public Cleansing Law (WMPCL), farmers in Japan are responsible for proper disposal of waste agricultural plastics (WAP). Because WAP from farms has such characteristics as being with small, many, dispersive, and spread over wide areas, and having seasonal discharge, building of efficient collection systems for WAP, development of processing technology, and expansion of recycling materials market are very important subjects for establishing recycling of WAP. Although regional differences still remain, the recycling rate of WAP expanded into 61 percent from 19 percent in Japan over the past 20 years through the cooperative dealing with local governments and Agricultural Coops in touch with the revision of WMPL. The overall process of the proper disposal of WAP is under both mandatory control while also subject to competitive markets. It has become to be concerned as trading materials in East Asia around after 2000, stopped for the dealings between the domestic persons before that. Reflecting such conditions, the processors who aim at export with simple disposal have steadily increased, and conventional processors failed their management of WAP recycling, which aims at the domestic circulation. Many newcomers have withdrawn and competition based on cost cutting has intensified in the current depression. As a result, the WAP recycling circulation continues to develop in East Asia wide, and its systematic management of the proper disposal has become more difficult.

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