South Korea's pledge to open its rice market, a politically charged issue angering local farmers, is getting blown off track and it will miss a target of higher imports this year, government officials and analysts said.
Parliament is due to vote on a bill on Wednesday to increase rice imports after failing to ratify it for nearly six months, and, even if passed, it is already too late to arrange physical delivery of the rice to meet this year's import quota, they said.
Delays pushing through the rice import agreement signed last year under the auspices of the World Trade Organisation will also be damaging for South Korea's global standing, they added.
"We could issue a tender by late November or December if parliament approves the bill this week," said Ju-Myung Lee, director of a rice-import task force at the Agriculture Ministry.
"With this action, we hope rice-exporting countries understand our willingness to open the market, although it is physically impossible to import rice this year."
From tender, contract to delivery, importing rice takes at least two or three months, he said. Locally grown rice costs four times that of foreign rice but up until now imports have been barred from stores and only a limited amount has been allowed to be used in food processing. Despite rising farmer anger, Seoul has agreed with leading rice-exporting countries to almost double quotas over the next decade, and to allow foreign rice in the stores.
Last year, it signed an agreement with nine rice-exporting countries, including the United States and China, to increase its quota of imported rice to 7.96 percent by 2014 from 4 percent of the country's total rice consumption.
Under this deal, South Korea has to import 225,575 tonnes this year, up from a quota of 205,000 tonnes last year.
"If the bill is not passed, it would mean that we break an international promise," Lee said. "Farmers and some politicians think we can re-negotiate with rice-exporting countries, but this is a very dangerous thought."
Another government official said rice-exporting countries, including the United States, had been pressing for movement from Korea to open the market, since the WTO meeting last September.
There was a risk that rice-exporting countries could file a suit over the issue with the WTO, he added.
"Failing to carry out rice import promise will make things very complicated, even though rice-exporting countries such as US and China won't easily file a suit against Korea, considering other economic and political issues," said In-Kyoei Shu, senior fellow of Korea Rural Economic Institute.
Some politicians may be losing their nerve over the issue due to the anger and power of the vocal farm lobby. Farmers frequently take to the streets to stage demonstrations that sometimes turn violent.
Last week, thousands of farmers, many wielding steel pipes and bamboo sticks, clashed with police both in Seoul and in the port city of Pusan, the location for a meeting of Pacific Rim leaders.
One farmer killed herself by drinking insecticide, leaving a suicide note urging lawmakers not to pass the bill, police said. Farmers, demanding the withdrawal of the plan and a new deal that would protect the domestic rice market from imports, held another rally in central Seoul near the parliament on Monday.
Left-wing Democratic Labour Party legislators are opposing the bill and one of their members, Kang Ki-kab, is in the 26th day of a hunger strike.
But the main opposition Grand National Party, which has a majority in the parliament, has said it will support the bill if the government does more to help farmers.
The government has promised financial assistance to help soothe the impact of the bill on farmers.
Comments
Comments are closed.