美國의 2002년 新 農業法 制定背景과 主要 內容

Abstract

The US new fram bill, officially titled the Farm Security and Rural Investment Act of 2002 was signed by president Bush May 13, 2002. The new farm bill replacing 1996 farm law will govern US farm policies through 2007. The major provisions of new farm bill includes a wide range of support programs for individual commodity, conservation, trade, rural development, forestry etc. Basically the new farm bill shows the expansion of the US government support on farm sector rather than before although, in many ways, the new bill follows the 1996 farm bill. It is mainly because the new farm bill was based on criticisms about 1996 farm act which was not properly effective in the US farm crisis, for example drastic decrease in grain price and farm income since 1998. Thus the 2002 farm bill strengthened the marketing assistance and direct payment which were in the previous farm bill, and newly introduced additional payment called counter-cyclic payments to famers when commodity prices fall below their target prices. This program was developed to replace ad hoc market loss assistance payments that was provided emergently to producers during 1998-2001 farm crisis. Of course US farmers' income tend to be secured and stabilized through this income-safety net programs which were expanded and introduced in the new farm bill. However all of these programs are not allowed freely under the current WTO Agreement on Agriculture. Therefore there is a high possibility of violation of reduction committment in US domestic support in the future, particularly in case of sharp decrease in agricultural market prices. In summary, the 2002 US farm bill tends to weaken and even move backward the market orientation and the reduction of government intervention in agricultural markets which had been emphasized in the previous US 1996 farm act. This implies that US negotiating strategies in the WTO agricultural negotiaion will focus on the market access rather than domestic support.