politics

U.S. rebukes Japan over tariffs on farm products

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I don't understand why a country so wealthy has so limited it's ability to enjoy the wonderful abundance of fruits, vegetables, wines, meats, cheeses, automobiles, etc. that the world offers. I just don't understand why Japanese consumers allow this?

8 ( +9 / -1 )

Of course, if the US products cannot compete on what Japanese people desire, that's a different issue entirely. I don't see why tariffs are even needed. It isn't like Hooters or McDs or GMC is taking over Japan. Just label all the farm products as being from the USA and let the market decide.

6 ( +10 / -4 )

Nothings gonna change, keep that Monsanto poison out anyhow.

5 ( +12 / -7 )

Every one the complaints noted had been covered in TPP that was all ready to go. So I have a hard time feeling too sorry for American producers. The rapid growth of beef, cheese, wine etc. imports into Japan from countries under the TPP and now under the Japan/EU agreement shows that Japanese consumers are willing to try these products and compare them to those they have enjoyed in Japan. Under TPP there were a number of trade offs between the US and and Japan. Lets see if the bilateral discussion now has USTR demanding things they already had under TPP but WITHOUT agreeing to those things in TPP that Japan had asked for. That should be a short discussion.

5 ( +5 / -0 )

If the Japanese rice market was ever made completely free, US producers would not be able to compete with rice from Australia and Thailand.

The US is completely hypocritical in complaining about Japanese tariffs. Just ask Canadian farmers about how free and open the US market is. Your ears will burn.

The US sugar market is as protected as the Japanese rice market and the US has a number of other highly protected markets including cotton.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/made-by-history/wp/2018/08/03/why-protectionism-soaks-american-consumers-twice/

Further, rice is not a particularly attractive market. Annual consumption per person has been declining for decades.

https://www.nippon.com/en/features/h00257/japanese-lose-their-taste-for-rice.html

I would also point out that more than one in three Americans is obese. Japanese may have to pay more for their food than Americans but at least they eat less crap and suffer far less in the way of disease and medical expense from the side effects of being obese.

5 ( +6 / -1 )

I'd like to criticize Japan on it's 'high tariffs' on Japanese produce on its OWN people. Absolutely insane how you get two similar products next to each other in a Japanese supermarket, one is Japanese, the other imported, and the imported is less than half the price. Mangoes, asparagus, grapes, bananas, canned fruit and vegetables, you name it.

4 ( +4 / -0 )

Once again, just gotta love good ol' Trumpy & Co. Tariffs - Not Fair.

Well I do believe his 1st job as potus back in Jan. 2017 was to withdraw from the TPP - you know the trade partneship with Japan and other Pacific countries. Members were bound to enjoy much sweeter trade deals than non-members. Pretty basic stuff.

His actual words on that show of strength moment were,

"....great thing for the American worker, what we just did,..."

Now they're crying a river - Not Fair.

4 ( +5 / -1 )

No GM or roundup thanks. I never buy US products and always check where the beans in tofu comes from. I also don’t eat fast food.

3 ( +11 / -8 )

Zichi:

Yuri may be referring to uncle Ben's and other minute rices. Haven't had any issues with even store brand jasmine or basmati.

3 ( +3 / -0 )

Regardless the tariffs I'll stay away from most US products whenever I can as they are mostly laced with growth hormones, antibiotics and pesticides.

2 ( +14 / -12 )

@Zichi is right. I know a man in Kyoto who has a tofu company. A small percentage are from japan which are more expensive and organic. The rest are either American or Canadian. Whenever the exchange rate or droughts happen in North America, the price goes up and he has big stress. If USA puts high tariffs on beans, he might go out of business.

2 ( +3 / -1 )

if you hadn't quit TPP, there wouldn't be tariffs on your agriculture product now, mr crying baby

1 ( +3 / -2 )

just asked a local torfu shop owner i know and the cheapest beans are..... Canadian, which i found interesting.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

As for automobiles. US cars are too big and gas guzzlers.

This isn't the 70's anymore. While I'm not a fan of American cars in general, the era of the big inefficient American car is long over.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Thefu:

Heh heh...t I t

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Kag:

That's how they grow big and strong...well big (tall and wide)

0 ( +4 / -4 )

Most Japanese will continue eating Japanese produce regardless of tariff. Fresher, safer and GM free. Perhaps California wine will be more popular if tariffs dropped, but not vegetables, fruits and meats.

0 ( +8 / -8 )

Just join the TPP. The problems solved.

0 ( +5 / -5 )

If you eat something here which has soya it most likely will be foreign beans.

Life is really far more simple. You buy your Shima dofu block, hot and fresh, at the neighborhood su-pa, delivered by your favorite producer at a very reasonable price and know you're buying wholesome goodness with good cospa. (Nobody bothers to question where raw materials come from knowing the producer wouldn't deal with garbage or they'd be run out of town.)

0 ( +0 / -0 )

ganbare said - "..Because Japanese produce and wine is safe ..."

This oft repeated comment usually comes with little or no back-up research or proof to be offered.

Firstly - compared with what?

2ndly - Japan is one of the largest users of agro-chemicals in the world - pesticides, herbicides, fertilizers etc. This is a fact easily confirmed by govt data.

3rdly - the labelling laws on processed foodstuffs here is way behind many other modern countries. Knowing what's exactly in a product is difficult to ascertain.

Don't get me wrong - I buy and consume Japanese grown produce daily and for the most I really like it. But I'm under no illusion that what I'm consuming is somehow miraculously safe.

Example - my friend who is a farmer and grows specialty vegetables for restaurants and hotels, told me she would never grow cabbage because it has to be sprayed with insecticide up to 30 times in it's growth period.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Grain, citrus, dairy, and wine tariffs have nothing to do with taste, Monsanto, or diet. They are to protect domestic manufacturers. In the 1980s Japanese negotiators argued against importing more American beef because Japanese intestines were too small for American beef and that American beef was not as good as Japanese beef. Then, in the 1990s a major Japanese company was caught relabeling American beef as Japanese beef and raising the price. They had been doing it for 20 years and no one complained that their beef didn't taste right. They were caught by a whistleblower. Japanese had been eating shabu-shabu, steak, ground beef, etc. for 20 years thinking it was Japanese beef. So, American beef is equal or better than Japanese beef. It can't be worse or someone would have complained during the 20-year scam.

If you don't like American food don't buy it. But, the fact you don't like it does not justify high import taxes that effectively ban American products from the market. The fact there is a tariff would imply fear that American products will gain market share. American rice is often used in frozen goods and at cheap sushi restaurants. Japanese have no problems eating it. American tobacco would destroy domestic growers. American wheat and barley would devastate Japanese farmers. I can buy a bag of American apples in the US for a few dollars but one Apple in Japan is more than 2 dollars. Just look at Japanese people's faces when they enter Costco for the first time and realize how badly they have been cheated by domestic companies.

It is irrelevant if Japanese rice is best. I don't need the best rice in the world to make onigiri. It is a joke that a rice ball costs 100 yen. It should cost 15-25 yen. Imported rice would kill Japanese rice in convenience stores across Japan. Japanese students would buy the 25 yen rice balls in a second over the 100 plus yen domestic ones.
0 ( +0 / -0 )

As for US tariffs - There have been sugar tariffs in America since the 18th Century resulting in a price 6 cents per pound above the world average. That is nothing compared to the import taxes Japan imposes on agricultural goods. Rice costs several dollars per kilo over the world average. The savings would free up lots of money to be spent on other goods to boost the economy.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

TPP will only partially open the Japanese agriculture market in 20 years! What a joke.

The collapse of the Tokyo stock market and the bubble economy is because it was a bubble. It had nothing to do with American pressure. The BOJ raised interest rates to kill the overheating economy. Asset prices became insanely high. Later, Japanese companies completely missed the Internet in the 1990s and early 2000s. Japanese consumer electronics and appliance companies were defeated by Chinese and South Koreans. Japanese computer companies were defeated by Intel, Microsoft, Micron, HP, Dell, and later Apple and Lenovo. Domestic cell phone makers were defeated because NTT was lazy and arrogant so did nothing to develop iMode from 1997-2008. iOS and Android destroyed them.

0 ( +0 / -0 )

Rebuke? like a father to a son?

0 ( +0 / -0 )

No GM or roundup thanks. I never buy US products and always check where the beans in tofu comes from. I also don’t eat fast food.

As opposed to Chinese products, ubiquitous in supermarkets, and even imported and branded by Aeon and others, give me US products anytime. If they eventually become cheaper with tariffs lifted, so much the better. Wisconsin cheese, baby. Tofu and other ethnic food; who's gonna buy US tofu. Use your common sense.

-1 ( +9 / -10 )

As for automobiles. US cars are too big and gas guzzlers.

Old Hat

America made Japan sign the unfair treaties, destroying Japan's growth for the next 3 decades.

What unfair treaties?

-1 ( +1 / -2 )

While I'm not a fan of American cars in general, the era of the big inefficient American car is long over.

Except for all those Americans who drive huge, inefficient pickup trucks these days.

-1 ( +0 / -1 )

US should raise tariffs on Japanese imports 1% every month for the next 40 months or until fair trade happens. Tit-for-tat.

-2 ( +7 / -9 )

Japan would probably "reduce" or even "eliminate" such tariffs. The quality of those commodities produced in Japan and the system of distribution is such that "price" may not become a factor in increasing the imports from the US or any other country.

That being said, any reduction in price of those products would certainly help the Japanese consumer. It may not help the farmers and producers, especially those "middle men" businesses "in between" the farms and the consumers as has been the trend, where logistics companies doing the transport of products have been gaining ground.

So it may not be a major problem for Japan to "please" Trump and the US farmers.

-2 ( +1 / -3 )

zichi, I was responding to a poster which implied a tariff on American exports.

-2 ( +0 / -2 )

Facts:

Japan has something called the lost decades.

It means that for the last 30 years Japan's economy has been stopped/bluntated/slow down completely.

In the 80s Japan was on the verge of surpassing Americas GDP. Everyone was talking about it.

What happened?

America made Japan sign the unfair treaties, destroying Japan's growth for the next 3 decades.

Benefits of being with the US alliance, keep Japan back militarily and economically, limited influence overseas, have to follow America path good or bad even if we don't agree.

-3 ( +2 / -5 )

Yet the USA has imposed tariffs on Japan and Nishiki Premium Rice is grown in California. When I am short on money I buy it in the commissary or when in the states. Zichi, it is alright but there is a difference. Is the difference worth the extra costs? I am not sure but the main problem is the bad reputation of USA rice. As for getting the Japanese government to do anything. Why would they pay attention to a person from Okinawa?

-3 ( +0 / -3 )

Regardless the tariffs I'll stay away from most US products whenever I can as they are mostly laced with growth hormones, antibiotics and pesticides.

No they are not.

-6 ( +6 / -12 )

zichi- California short grain rice is the exact same rice grown here in Japan in the exact same way by Japanese farmers.

I disagree while the California rice is a lot better than the yucky long grain American rice, there is no substitute for the delicious Japanese grown product. I do serve delicious Nishiki Premium Rice in America but again it does not stand up to the real thing.

-8 ( +2 / -10 )

American rice is just disgusting! I remember it from my youth. It goes along with whale meat on the disgusting scale. So drop the tariffs, the Japanese people will refuse to buy it.

Ah Good Luck to You, why would the USA put a tariff on its own products?

-9 ( +2 / -11 )

I don't understand why a country so wealthy has so limited it's ability to enjoy the wonderful abundance of fruits, vegetables, wines, meats, cheeses, automobiles, etc. that the world offers. I just don't understand why Japanese consumers allow this?

Because Japanese produce and wine is safe and no G.M. As for automobiles. US cars are too big and gas guzzlers. Japanese consumers are real happy.

-9 ( +4 / -13 )

@ Pukey - its price yoy pay for Japan Quality. Labor costs are higher, farm rental costs, and so on, compared to foreign producers.

-10 ( +3 / -13 )

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