Accelerating Exports to Asia is the Only Way to Regenerate Japanese Agriculture

By SHINDO Eiichi
Professor Emeritus of Tsukuba University

The "manifesto campaign boom" shook the Japanese politics. Points in the political disputes are US-Japan Free Trade Agreement (FTA) related with the agricultural policies and the Japanese future growth strategies. Both of them would influence seriously the Japanese local economies such as those in Hokkaido prefecture, "a kingdom of agricultural economy" which has been in serious recession. The nature of election campaign manifestos is indication not only of the commitments on specific policies in the future but also of those in the past, just as the nature of the business contracts. We could, in this context, remember the past policies on the FTAs as well as the agricultural policies, which then Foreign Minister Aso Taro had advocated as part of the Japanese novel foreign policy named "the Arc of Freedom and Prosperity," comprising such democratic prosperous countries in the Asia-Pacific region as the United States, Australia, New Zealand, India, Japan and Korea. Under such a grandiose foreign policy, he committed and pursued the FTA policy with Australia. The FTA with Australia as it was planned would have seriously damaged our agricultural sectors including those of Hokkaido prefecture. It has to be pointed out that the size of cultivated land in Japan and Korea per farming household is only about 1.5 hectares, whereas those in the U.S. and Australia are 196 hectares and 4100 respectively. This huge difference in the size of faming lands would end up in devastating the Japanese agricultural sectors even those of Hokkaido area. The past commitments on trade and agricultural policies have indicated the lack of the comprehensive strategy of public policies to regenerate our agriculture.

It is time to think over how Japan should deal with the impacts of the FTA just concluded between the U.S. and Korea, which completely ruled out rice as the subject of tariff free articles to protect the agricultural sector in Korea. Hence, it is time for us to regain the competitiveness in the U. S vis-à-vis Korean exported goods, and at the same time to explore the way to regenerate agriculture in Japan, The answer should be the dual strategies both to improve the deteriorated ratio of food self-sufficiency, and to take advantages of the current global revolution in information technologies and environment conservation. It is easy to promise, but difficult to realize, the improvement of the food self-sufficiency ratio and of the deteriorated welfare policies, so as to regain and maintain the economic growth, since the welfare policies would need the vast amount of financial revenue. The growth strategy would be impossible unless we make a radical shift from the conservative neoliberal policy sacrificing the weak and the social safety-nets. It would be also impossible to turn the current food self-sufficiency ratio from 40 percents, the lowest one among the developed countries, even to 50 percents, unless we make the drastic change in the traditional policies of depending heavily on the governmental subsidies that Japan has adopted for the past half a century. Even in the U.K., it took twenty years to improve the food self-sufficiency ratio from 45 percents in 1965 to over 70 percents in late 1980's. The key ingredient for the agricultural regeneration should be to adopt the "individual household income support system," which the EU countries including the U.K. have adopted. Hence, it is called the "EU formula." It certainly aims at fostering farmers by directly subsidizing each farming household based on the differences between the retail prices and the farms production costs against the imported agricultural goods.

In this respect, it is vitally important for the Japanese political parties either JDP or LDP to leave off the rice acreage reduction policy which has resulted in enormous increase in abandoned lands of cultivation. Instead, we should take the firm policy to stimulate the agriculture through the "individual household income support system." The current campaign manifestos of both the ruling party and the opposition remain fixed to a narrowly defined egocentric "one-country-approach." They have been so obsessed with the idea of the outmoded mythology of the Cold War centering on the U.S. -Japan alliance, using the semantics of the "diplomatic continuity." As a result, Japan has lost many chances to lead and coexist with Asia, which have been the driving forces of the world economy. We should take the strategy to expand export of our value-added agricultural products to the mega-market of rising and affluent East Asia. It will open up a window of opportunity to regenerate the Japanese agriculture. Hokkaido, "a kingdom of agricultural economy," with the comparatively large size of the farming land as the one in EU countries, would play a central role in initiating and pursuing this strategy through applying the edge of the information technology to the food industry sector. It is vital to enhance the added values of the agricultural products, to brand and commercialize them in broader affluent markets in Asia. The current agricultural sector is not the primary industry in a traditional sense any more. It has become so-called the "sixth industrial sector" multiplying both the second and the third ones through their closer cooperation with business, industrial and academic circles. Hokkaido would certainly contribute to revitalizing the Japanese agriculture and to building up the food supplying base for the regional food security regime in East Asia.

Regenerating the agriculture would also be one of the main vehicles to reduce the carbon dioxide, marking for strengthening the current environmental revolutionary movements through absorption of it by forests. These ecological policies were agreed and declared at the Hokkaido Toyako Summit in June 2008 and since then have been gradually implemented. Now we should promote more aggressively an East Asian community building with the emerging food and ecological security regime in East Asia and put forward a bolder strategy of strengthening the cooperative ties with Asia in these agricultural and environmental industry sectors as well. For the past 20 years, while the ratio of total amount of Japanese trade with the U.S. decreased from 27.4 to 13.7 percents, the one with China increased dramatically from 3.5 to 20.4 percents and the one with Asia makes up 48.8 and the one with Eurasia 73.9 percents respectively. This new reality of dramatic changes of global balance of power and trade indicates us the ways to regenerate Japan's economy and agriculture through our much closer ties with Asian nations.

Source: The Council on East Asian Community (CEAC) E-Letter (10 November 2009, Vol. 2, No. 7)

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Japan’s Rice Farmers Fear Their Future Is Shrinking

This broad coastal plain near the Sea of Japan, blessed with abundant water and rich soil and checkered with rice paddies hued golden yellow in the early spring, is one of the country’s most fertile granaries. But there is an unmistakable malaise here.

The farmers who work the paddies are graying and dwindling in number. Abandoned, overgrown plots are a common sight. Because of how small their farms are and how far rice prices have fallen, many farmers find it impossible to make ends meet.

“Japanese agriculture has no money, no youth, no future,” said one farmer, Hitoshi Suzuki, 57, who stood on his 450-year-old family farm as an icy wind blew from the sea.

The troubles on the farm are emblematic of an overall feeling of paralysis gripping Japan, the world’s second-largest economy. Faced with mounting challenges from an aging population and chronic low growth, the nation has tried to preserve the status quo, in essence by burning through its vast accumulated wealth, rather than make tough changes, economists say.
“Japan’s rural crisis offers a glimpse of the entire nation’s future,” said Yasunari Ueno, an economist at Mizuho Securities in Tokyo.

To hear many farmers and agricultural experts tell it, rural Japan is fast approaching some sort of dead end, the result of depopulation, trade liberalization and depleted government coffers. They speak of the worst rural crisis since World War II. In Shonai, farmland prices have dropped as much as 70 percent in the past 15 years, and the number of farmers has shrunk by half since 1990.

Across Japan, production of rice, the traditional staple grain, has fallen 20 percent in a decade, raising alarms in a nation that now imports 61 percent of its food, according to the government’s Statistic Bureau.

Aging is seen as the biggest problem in rural areas, where, according to the Agriculture Ministry, 70 percent of Japan’s three million farmers are 60 or older. Since 2000, soaring deficits have forced Tokyo to halve spending on public works projects, which propped up rural economies, and plunging exports have now eliminated factory jobs on which many farming households depended for extra income.

While the current global financial crisis has added to the grimness, the root causes lie in Japan’s rural economic system of tiny, woefully inefficient family farms, which dates back to the end of World War II. But while many farmers and agriculture experts agree that this system is breaking down, change has been blocked by an array of vested interests and a fear of disturbing the established ways.

The question now is whether some sort of breaking point might soon be reached.
A change could be significant because rural voters form the base of a political pyramid at whose apex stands the Liberal Democratic Party, which has governed Japan for more than half a century. The party is expected to face a tight race with the main opposition Democratic Party in general elections that must be called by early September.

In rural regions like Yamagata, the northern rice basket prefecture where Shonai is located, the signs remain mixed.

Takashi Kudo, the owner of a construction company here, said he remained a loyal supporter of Liberal Democratic lawmakers, who helped the local economy and his company with spending on local projects. Now, however, he said that his company’s sales have dropped by two-thirds over the last decade, forcing him to lay off half of his 23 employees.

Times are so tough that the local Shinto shrine has stopped hiring musicians for summer festivals, he said. Local residents feel abandoned by the party, leading to declining membership in election support groups, he said. But residents are not embracing the opposition, which he said suffered from the same lack of direction as the governing party.

“The reaction has been political disillusionment, not political revolt,” said Mr. Kudo, 45, sitting in his office below a photograph of his district’s Liberal Democratic lawmaker, Koichi Kato.
Still, there are growing calls here to give the Democrats a try. In January, a little-known school board member who ran as the opposition candidate unseated the incumbent Liberal Democrat to become governor of Yamagata, which had been firmly Liberal Democratic for generations.
“There is a feeling that the L.D.P. is growing out of touch with real rural problems,” said Takeshi Hosono, a director at Shogin Future-Sight Institute, a market research company based in the city of Yamagata.

Many Yamagata residents feel the party has gone too far in liberalizing trade and cutting public spending, Mr. Hosono said, reflecting resentment that cities like Tokyo have prospered in recent years while rural areas waned.

Others say they feel the Liberal Democrats have not gone far enough in reforms, complaining that the party and local groups that support it have been blocking local farmers from making big improvements that challenge the status quo.

One of those innovators is Kazushi Saito, a rice and pig farmer who six years ago took on one of rural Japan’s most powerful institutions, the national agricultural cooperative, by trying to establish his own, smaller, alternative co-op. He signed up 120 other farmers disgruntled with the national cooperative, which they said they felt only tried to sell them expensive machinery and fertilizer.

But when he sought to register his new co-op, as allowed by law, the prefectural agricultural officials refused to do the paperwork, effectively killing the plan, he said.
“Vested interests are running Japanese agriculture into a wall,” Mr. Saito, 52, said.
Mr. Saito and other farmers said the government also throws up barriers against the most obvious remedy to agriculture’s problems, the creation of larger, more efficient farms. The average Japanese commercial farm is now just 4.6 acres, compared with about 440 acres for the average American farm.

While the government says that such consolidation is needed, Mr. Saito and others say their efforts to accumulate land are hindered by price supports on farmland, which were intended to protect the value of small farmers’ assets but which make the property too expensive to buy. Limits on rice production, also intended to help small farmers by propping up rice prices, make it difficult to expand production, many farmers say.

Even with price supports, moreover, an easing of import restrictions and a decline in demand related to Japan’s changing eating habits have driven down rice prices, hurting farms of all sizes. This has fed rising anger not only with the Liberal Democrats but also with Japan’s powerful ministries, which have traditionally guided this nation but now seem unable to lead the way out of the morass.

“The postwar era of depending on Tokyo is clearly over,” said Shonai’s mayor, Maki Harada.
Mr. Suzuki, with the 450-year-old family farm, has quadrupled the land he tills to 40 acres, most of it rented from retired farmers. But inflated land prices, restrictions on rice production and the high cost of Japan’s highly mechanized farming have simply meant that his bigger farm loses more money than neighboring smaller ones, he said.

“Agriculture could resuscitate local economies, if it were made healthy again,” said Masayoshi Honma, a professor of agriculture at the University of Tokyo. “Without reform, it will just decline to death.”

Source: The New York Times, March 28, 2009

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Draft Jepang tentang MRL Chlorantranilprole, Metaflumizone, Methyl iodide, Paromomycin, dan Flunixin

Pada tanggal 11 Maret 2009 Standards and Evaluation Division, Department of Safety, Pharmaceutical and Food Safety Bureau, Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (MHLW) telah mengadakan Conference for Establishment of Maximum Residue Limits for Agricultural Chemicals (Chlorantranilprole, Metaflumizone, Methyl iodide, Paromomycin, and Flunixin) in Food di Kantor Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), Kasumigaseki, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo.

Konferensi ini selain dihadiri oleh pejabat MHLW juga dihadiri oleh para perwakilan dari beberapa Kedutaan Besar di Jepang, termasuk KBRI Tokyo.

Latar Belakang

Dalam penjelasan artikel 11, paragraf 1 Food Sanitation Law, disebutkan bahwa MHLW berwenang menetapkan standar residu (Maximum Residue Limits: MRL) untuk pestisida, makanan tambahan, dan obat hewan (selanjutnya disebut bahan kimia pertanian) yang masih tersisa dalam makanan. Makanan yang dipasarkan di Jepang harus sesuai dengan standar yang telah di tetapkan oleh pemerintah Jepang.

Pada 29 Mei 2006, MHLW telah memperkenalkan sistem positive list untuk bahan kimia pertanian dalam makanan. Pada prinsipnya semua makanan yang didistribusikan di pasar Jepang harus mengikuti peraturan yang berazaskan pada sistem yang ditetapkan oleh MHLW tersebut.

MHLW akan menetapkan MRL terbaru untuk beberapa komoditi makanan, untuk itu MHLW telah menelaah secara komprehensif MRL yang selama ini berlaku. Kegiatan pengkajian ini ditujukan pada 5 bahan kimia yaitu Chlorantraniliprole (pestisida), Metaflumizone (pestisida), Methyl iodide (pestisida), Paromomycin (obat hewan) dan Flunixin (obat hewan).

Sebagai catatan bahwa sistem positive list ditetapkan berdasarkan pada amandemen 2003 Food Sanitation Law Jepang. Sistem ini bertujuan untuk melarang distribusi makanan di pasar Jepang apabila makanan tersebut mengandung bahan kimia pertanian melebihi kadar tertentu (0.01 ppm) yang telah ditetapkan oleh Peraturan yang berlaku.

Garis Besar Revisi MRL

1. Chlorantraniliprole (insektisida)

Chlorantraniliprole dilarang digunakan di Jepang. Pada saat ini Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF) telah menetapkan aturan tentang bahan kimia ini berdasarkan Agricultural Chemical Regulation Law. Telah terdapat permohonan dari pengusaha asing untuk penetapan MRL bahan kimia ini. Selama ini mengacu pada peraturan MRL untuk bahan kimia pertanian yang digunakan diluar Jepang, yang dipublikasikan 5 Pebruari 2004. Untuk merespon kebijakan MAFF dan permintaan para pengusaha tersebut, MHLW telah menetapkan MRL baru untuk beberapa tanaman pangan. Sebelum ini di Jepang belum terdapat MRL Chlorantraniliprole untuk tanaman pangan.

Pada konferensi ini telah disampaikan draft MRL Chlorantraniliprole untuk Beras 0.05 ppm, Kedelai kering 0.2 ppm, Kentang 0.01 ppm, Kubis, Kubis China dan Brussels sprouts 4.0 ppm; Kol, Komatsuna, Kyona, dan Qing-geng-cai 11 ppm; Kol Kembang dan Broccoli 4.0 ppm; Watercress, Endive, Shungiku, Lettuce, Bayam, Seledri dan daun Seledri 13.0 ppm; Welsh 2.0 ppm; Tomat, Terung, Pimiento 0.7 ppm; Labu, Semangka, Melon 0.25 ppm; Mentimun 0.3 ppm; dan Kedelai hijau 1.0 ppm. MRL untuk buah Apel, Peach, Nectarine, Apricot, Japanese Plum, dan Cherry 1.0 ppm; Pear 0.5 ppm; Quince, Loquat, biji kapas 0.3 ppm; Strawberry 0.7 ppm; anggur 1.2 ppm; Teh 50 ppm. MRL untuk produk binatang daging sapi dan babi, lemak sapi dan babi, hati sapi dan babi, ginjal sapi dan babi, dan susu 0.01 ppm; dan hewan air 0.05 ppm.

2. Metaflumizone (insektisida)

Metaflumizone dilarang digunakan di Jepang. Pada saat ini MAFF telah menetapkan bahan kimia dimasukkan pada Agricultural Chemical Regulation Law. Sebelum ini di Jepang belum terdapat MRL Metaflumizone untuk tanaman pangan. Yang tergolong Metaflumizone meliputi (E)-Metaflumizone, (Z)-Metaflumizone, p(m-(trifluoromethyl)phenacyl)benzonitrile.

Pada konferensi ini telah disampaikan draft MRLs Metaflumizone untuk kubis 5 ppm sedangkan kubis China 10 ppm.

3. Methyl iodide (fumigant)

Methyl iodide dilarang digunakan di Jepang. Pada saat ini MAFF telah menetapkan bahan kimia ini diatur dengan Agricultural Chemical Regulation Law. Sebelum ini di Jepang belum terdapat MRL Methyl iodide untuk tanaman pangan.

Pada konferensi ini telah disampaikan draft MRL Methyl iodide untuk tomat dan melon 0.05 ppm dan chestnut 0.5 ppm. Sedangkan MRL untuk komoditi lain seragam yakni 0.01 ppm.

4. Paromomycin (antimicrobial)

Paromomycin dilarang digunakan di Jepang. MHLW telah menelaah secara komprehensif MRLs guna menetapkan pengenalan sistem baru sementara. MRL sementara yang berlaku pada saat itu berdasarkan pada Stadar Eropa (EU). Akan tetapi MHLW akan mencabut MRLs sementara tersebut yang pada saat ini masih tercatat dalam daftar MRL sementara (Item 7, Section A “General Compositional Standards for Food” Part I “Food” of the Specifications and Standardss for Food, Food Additives, Etc.). Menurut penilaian MHLW sangat sulit untuk menyusun standar berdasarkan alasan ilmiah karena Jepang tidak dapat mengkonfirmasi situasi yang pasti pada saat penetapan standar EU sebagai pedoman disebabkan keterbatasan informasi penting mengenai residu. Setelah revisi ini diberlakukan, Paramomycin (antimicrobial) ini tidak diperbolehkan tersisa dalam semua makanan, berdasarkan persyaratan Item 1, Section A yang menyebutkan bahwa makanan tidak boleh mengandung antimicrobial atau antibacterial sintetis. MRL yang selama ini berlaku untuk Paromomycin pada daging dan lemak sapi dan babi 0.5 ppm; hati dan ginjal sapi dan babi 2 ppm, daging dan lemak ayam dan unggas lain 0.5 ppm; hati dan ginjal ayam dan unggas lain 2 ppm, Salmoniformes, Anguiliformes, Perciformes, Shelled mollusks, Crustaceans, dan ikan dan binatang air lainnya 0.5 ppm. Setelah revisi ini disahkan dan diimplementasikan maka semua komoditi diatas tidak diperbolehkan mengandung Paromomycin dan antibacterial sintetisnya.

5. Flunixin (non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug)

Flunixin selama ini telah diperbolehkan digunakan di Jepang. Pada saat ini MAFF telah memutuskan untuk merevisi standar penggunaan bahan kimia ini yang mengacu pada Pharmaceutical Affairs Law. Untuk merespon kebijakan MAFF ini, MHLW telah menelaah secara komprehensif MRL yang sedang berlaku untuk menetapkan MRL baru. Draft MRL Flunixin untuk semua komoditi tidak terdapat perubahan, untuk daging sapi 0.02 ppm; hati sapi 0.3 ppm; daging babi 0.05 ppm; lemak sapi dan ginjal babi 0.03 ppm; lemak dan hati babi 0.2 ppm; ginjal sapi 0.1 ppm; dan susu (dalam bentuk 5-hydroxy flunixin) 0.04 ppm.

Sebelum revisi MRL ini diberlakukan, MHLW memberikan kesempatan kepada semua pihak untuk memberikan tanggapan terhadap draft revisi ini agar disampaikan sebelum tanggal 25 Maret 2009 kepada Standards and Evaluation Division, Department of Safety, Pharmaceutical and Food Safety Bureau, Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare 1-2-2 Kasumigaseki, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 100-8916, Telepon +81-3-5253-1111 Fax: +81-3-3501-4868. Contact person: Mr. Katsuhiro Ogi (ogi-katsuhiro@mhlw.go.jp)

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Zen Noh Koperasi Terbesar di Dunia

Zen Noh Jepang merupakan koperasi terbesar dari 300 koperasi yang diranking ICA. Dengan basis pertanian, jejaring Zen Noh telah merambah ke berbagai bisnis, yang menjangkau banyak negara. Padahal, koperasi ini baru dibentuk pada 1972, jauh lebih muda ketimbang koperasi-koperasi raksasa di Eropa dan Amerika Serikat.

Para petani Jepang, memiliki re­but tawar (bargaining position) yang luar biasa kuat, dalam konste­lasi ekonomi dan politik di negaranya. Sudah menjadi pengetahuan umum, kalau berbagai komoditi pertanian yang dihasilkan petani­nya, jauh lebih mahal ketimbang komoditi sejenis di negara lain. Tapi, pemerintah Jepang tidak bi­sa sembarangan mengimpor komoditi tersebut, tanpa persetujuan petani. Jatuhnya menteri pertanian karena mengabaikan aspirasi peta­ni, bukan hal yang aneh terjadi di Jepang.

Kekuatan luar biasa dimiliki peta­ni Jepang, antara lain karena mereka solid berhimpun dalam koperasi pertanian. Tapi, soliditas itu bukan cuma ditunjukkan untuk menekan (pressure group), melainkan juga da­lam me­ngembangkan jaringan bisnis. Dan, ini yang terpenting, semuanya memungkinkan lantaran para petani Jepang berhimpun dalam koperasi.

Koperasi pertanian Jepang, mem­bentang dalam sebuah jaringan yang kokoh, dari tingkat primer hingga sekunder, yang berpuncak pada Zen Noh sebagai ferederasi koperasi pertanian di tingkat nasional. Dengan perputaran omset mencapai 63.449 dolar AS, atau Rp 583,73 triliun) pertahun, saat ini Zen Noh menem­pati urutan tertinggi dalam ICA Global 300, yang dirilis International Co-operative Alliance (ICA) pada Oktober 2007 lalu.

Zen Noh berdiri pada 30 Maret 1972, hasil penggabungan dua sekunder koperasi pertanian level nasional, yaitu Zenkoren (yang ber­gerak dalam pengadaan kebutuhan pertanian) dan Zenhanren (bergerak di bidang pemasaran pro­duk pertanian). Kedua sekunder ko­perasi ini berdiri pada 1948.

Secara keseluruhan, Zen Noh menghimpun 1.173 koperasi pertanian, 1.010 di antaranya merupakan primer koperasi pertanian. Sisanya merupakan sekunder koperasi pertanian tingkat provinsi, federasi kope­rasi lain yang terkait dengan bidang pertanian dan peternakan. Hampir semua kebutuh­an petani Jepang, dipenuhi melalui koperasi (umumnya disebut JA atau Nohkyo). Mulai dari penga­daan berbagai peralatan dan input pertanian, permodalan, sampai pe­masaran produk pertanian. Bahkan, kebutuhan barang sehari-hari pun, diperoleh lewat koperasi.

Dengan jaringannya, koperasi pertanian Jepang menangani sektor pertanian dari hulu sampai hilir, termasuk sektor pendukungnya se­per­ti keuangan dan asuransi. Pada awalnya, tanaman pertanian yang menjadi perhatian adalah padi. Total produksi beras yang dihasilkan, rata-rata mencapai 1,58 juta ton per tahun.

Namun, pada perkembangan selanjutnya, koperasi juga mengarahkan petani untuk melakukan diversivikasi tanaman. Hal ini dilakukan agar tidak terjadi over supply beras sehingga harganya jatuh. Koperasi selalu mengupayakan agar harga setiap komoditi di tingkat petani tetap tinggi, sesuai dengan standar hidup di Jepang, yang termasuk paling tinggi di dunia.

Tidak seperti negara berkembang yang pada umumnya mengor­bankan sektor pertanian untuk membangun industri, yaitu de­ngan memperkecil nilai tukar hasil pertanian di hadapan barang produk industri, di Jepang nilai tukar ke­duanya selalu diusahakan setara. Dengan begitu, tingkat kesejahtera­an para petani, tidak ketinggalan dengan masyarakat yang bekerja di sektor industri.

Strategi tersebut, bukan tanpa risiko. Semula, Jepang memang bisa menerapkan kebijakan untuk mela­rang impor komoditi pertanian yang banyak dihasilkan petaninya, kendati harganya jauh lebih mahal di ban­ding pasar dunia. Namun, pada 1993, Jepang dipaksa membuka keran impor, melalui Kese­pakatan Umum tentang Tarif dan Perdagangan (GATT). Berdasarkan kesepakatan itu, mulai 1995 Jepang membuka impor beras, mes­kipun dibatasi hanya 4 persen dari kebutuhan beras dalam negeri. Memasuki tahun 2000, batasan itu diberbesar menjadi 4,8 persen.

Namun, Pemerintah Jepang te­tap melindungi petaninya, antara lain dengan menetapkan bea masuk cukup tinggi, di samping tetap memberikan subsidi pada input pertanian. Melalui koperasi, peta­ni Jepang memang mempunyai lobi yang kuat di pemerintahan. Bahkan di Partai Demokrat Libe­ral (LDP) yang merupakan partai besar, banyak orang koperasi yang berkiprah. Mereka mampu meyakinkan pemerintah, bahwa membatasi impor komoditi pertanian dalam jangka panjang bakal menumbulkan ketergantung­an yang bisa berakibat fatal. Dalam jangka pendek, melindungi pertanian di dalam negeri juga terkait de­ngan stabilitas politik nasional.

Lantas, apakah pertanian Jepang menjadi pasif berlindung di balik proteksi pemerintah? Tentu saja, tidak. Koperasi pertanian Jepang aktif melakukan kampanye yang mengu­sung tema “Produk Lokal untuk Kon­sumen Lokal”. Upaya untuk menjaga loyalitas penduduk Jepang pada produk pertanian dalam negeri ini, tidaklah semata-mata mengandalkan unsur emosional, tapi juga rasional.

Kendati harganya relatif lebih tinggi, koperasi pertanian menjamin bahwa seluruh komoditi pertanian yang dihasilkan anggotanya, memenuhi standar higienis tinggi. De­ngan label dengan system bar-code di setiap kemasan pertanian yang dibeli di toko koperasi, konsu­men dengan jelas mengetahui siapa petani yang menanam produk yang mereka beli. Maka, jika terjadi se­suatu, komplain lebih mudah di lakukan. Agar produk pertanian itu bisa dijual lebih murah, kope­rasi membangun jaringan toko sendiri, sehingga bisa memotong jalur distribusi.

Perkembangan bisnis setiap kope­rasi pertanian di Jepang, pada gilirannya, mendorong Zen Noh untuk terus melebarkan sayap bisnisnya, dengan jaringan yang tersebar di 26 negara, termasuk Indonesia, dan memiliki afiliasi dengan 249 perusahaan. Jumlah karyawannya mencapai 12,5 ribu orang lebih.

Sumber: Majalah-pip.com 2008

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Reformasi Pertanian di Jepang

Pada bulan April 2007, Gugus Tugas Promosi Kebijakan Pangan, Pertanian dan Wilayah Pedesaan yang dipimpin oleh Perdana Menteri telah mengadopsi paket kebijakan yang berorientasi pada sasaran yang disesuaikan dengan sasaran kebijakan kabinet sektor pertanian, yakni:

1) untuk memanfaatkan secara penuh kapasitas produksi yang berpotensi pada bidang pertanian dan untuk mengembangkan pertanian sebagai industri penting yang strategis di abad 21;

2) untuk memenuhi permintaan produk yang berkwalitas tinggi dan permintaan keamanan pangan bagi konsumen, dan untuk melaksanakan rencana yang terdiri dari (i) reformasi agraria yang dikonsentrasikan pada lahan pertanian petani utama dalam rangka memperkuat struktur pertanian Jepang dan (ii) penetapan Strategi Kementerian Pertanian, Kehutanan dan Perikanan dalam pencegahan Global Warming.

Respon Jepang terhadap melambungnya harga produk pertanian di dunia dan terhadap menurunnya swasembada pangan, pada bulan Mei 2008 Gugus Tugas Promosi Kebijakan Pangan, Pertanian dan Wilayah Pedesaan yang dipimpin oleh Perdana Menteri telah mengadopsi aksi dan tindakan nyata yang harus dikembangkan bukan hanya oleh Kementerian Pertanian, Kehutanan dan Perikanan tetapi juga oleh Jepang secara menyeluruh. Program-programnya meliputi:

1) mengembangkan dan mempopulerkan produk-produk tepung beras, produksi pakan ternak dari sawah dan meningkatkan swasembada pakan ternak untuk memperkuat kapasitas suplai makanan domestik;

2) menambahkan informasi yang benar pada label kemasan makanan untuk meningkatkan kepercayaan konsumen;

3) mengembangkan program stabilisasi menejemen pertanian yang ditujukan kepada Petani Utama;

4) membangun suatu sistem dimana perusahaan dan masyarakat yang berasal dari bidang yang beranekaragam dapat memasuki sektor pertanian;

5) memanfaatkan kembali lahan “tidur”;

6) meningkatkan kerjasama di antara petani, industri makanan lokal dan perusahaan pengecer lokal guna revitalisasi wilayah pedesaan.

Rating: 5 Reviewer: Info Petani - ItemReviewed: Reformasi Pertanian di Jepang - 9756people
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