The purpose of this article is to explain why Japan, with its food self-sufficiency rate at 40%, is at risk from severe tariff reductions and why it should be accorded special dispensations in WTO agreements on agriculture. The main issue evaluated is whether substantial net food importing...

Multifunctionality in agriculture has become a catchword. This paper focuses on public arrangements to finance this service provision by agriculture as dependent on trade negotiations. Multifunctionality implies a reallocation of resources from food production to amenity provision and has...

This article focuses on how to achieve non-trade concerns (NTC) and multifunctional goals that countries may have with minimal trade-distortion. The term 'multifunctional agriculture' focuses on the issue that agriculture, in addition to the production of food and fibre, also may provide...

In seeking appropriate economic policies to address non-trade concerns (NTC), a distinction must be made between those concerns that relate to market failure and the misallocation of resources, and those that relate to distributional issues. To deal with both types of NTC, domestic policies are...

The multifunctionality nature of agriculture has been used to justify continuing protection for the agricultural sector. The farm sector produces a variety of outputs, some of which are marketable (or tradable) and others not. Protectionism, under the guise of multifunctionality, is then...

This paper analyses the World Trade Organisation (WTO) as an international organisation and its relationship to the reform of international trade in agriculture. The membership and modes of decision making are outlined with special relevance to trade in agriculture. The doctrine of 'non-trade...

The debate over non-trade concerns (NTC) and trade liberalisation for the past decade is reviewed and convergences and remaining conflicts are identified. It is found that, while the legitimacy of multifunctionality is no longer controversial and there is a convergence of the views on the best...

The challenge for any trade agreement is to be adaptable enough to enable countries to address legitimate non-trade concerns (NTC) while being restrictive enough to limit harm to other countries and to assist the creation of free international markets. In this paper, we focus on how...