Dutch minister urges Japan to revamp farm policy+.TOKYO, Nov. 28 Kyodo Visiting Dutch Minister of Agriculture, Nature Management and Fisheries Laurens Jan Brinkhorst Laurens Jan Brinkhorst (born March 18 1937) is a Dutch D66 politician. Brinkhorst has been an undersecretary of state of foreign affairs and a minister of agriculture. Furthermore he has presided the D66-group at the Second Chamber of the Dutch parliament. on Tuesday asked Japan to redress its ''highly protectionist'' agricultural policy Agricultural policy describes a set of laws relating to domestic agriculture and imports of foreign agricultural products. Governments usually implement agricultural policies with the goal of achieving a specific outcome in the domestic agricultural product markets. . He told the Foreign Correspondents Club of Japan that Tokyo should change its policy of maintaining high prices of rice and other farm products with government subsidies and let prices reflect global market conditions. Brinkhorst, who served as European Commission European Commission, branch of the governing body of the European Union (EU) invested with executive and some legislative powers. Located in Brussels, Belgium, it was founded in 1967 when the three treaty organizations comprising what was then the European Community ambassador to Japan between 1982 and 1987, argued for ''reasonable income support for farmers'' in lieu of the existing price support. Speaking against the entirely regulation-free agricultural policy called for by the United States United States, officially United States of America, republic (2005 est. pop. 295,734,000), 3,539,227 sq mi (9,166,598 sq km), North America. The United States is the world's third largest country in population and the fourth largest country in area. , he said an income-support approach would be in the interests of Japan and of farm exporters, especially in the Third World. The Dutch minister fell short of saying Japan's tightly protected rice market should be opened to more foreign competition so that rice can be offered to consumers at international market prices. He said Japan and the European Union European Union (EU), name given since the ratification (Nov., 1993) of the Treaty of European Union, or Maastricht Treaty, to the European Community need to launch a ''strategic dialogue'' on farm issues such as self-sufficiency and food safety. |
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