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New Free Trade Agreements Will Improve California Farm Export Prospects.Immigration Reform: What's Next for Agriculture?OPEC and the Environmental Impact of Biofuels.

After several years of informal and formal negotiations, South Korea and the United States reached an agreement to move towards free trade in April 2007. Currently, both countries await congressional approval before the agreement can be implemented. This study explains the substance of the agricultural parts of the agreement and considers its agricultural implications.

The role of agriculture in Northeast Asian cooperation has been important for many years. However, the end of the Cold War and the recent security concerns in Northeast Asia have made this issue more urgent. In addition, recent developments in international agricultural relations have changed the context in which nations of the region are now making agricultural and food-related policy. These broader issues provide the context for this paper.It has long been understood that food and agriculture are vital to the security of any nation or region. However, the nature of this relationship is sometimes misunderstood: it is easy to overlook the fact that a goal of food and agricultural security is consistent with a goal of economic progress and overall economic security. It is now more widely accepted that liberalized trade and privatization of agriculture are critically important for economic development and income growth, whereas restricted trade and food self-sufficiency objectives diminish economic growth and security. This theme underlies the argument of the present paper.The overall objective of the paper is to describe the current agricultural situation in North Korea, South Korea, China, and Japan with reference to the issues of food security and agricultural cooperation. The paper will succinctly describe trends in agricultural supply, demand, and trade for each of the four countries. In addition, where important for understanding supply and demand trends, there will be a brief explanation of the impact of recent developments in domestic agricultural policy. A discussion of future subregional cooperative possibilities concludes the paper.

This article attempts to link commercially arranged cross-border marriages to the discussion of the commodification of intimacy and to explore how a transnational phenomenon is contextualized in national politics. The question of commodification – what can or cannot be assigned economic value – has been a contentious area of intersection between economics and ethics, and intimacy has often been at the heart of the recent debate on commodification. Yet, commercially arranged cross-border marriages are perceived differently in Vietnam, a country that sends brides, and in Korea, a country that receives brides. In Vietnam, cross-border marriage has been portrayed negatively and is often associated with trafficking in women. Although a similar discourse exists in Korea, the official discourse on cross-border marriage has focused on supporting multicultural families. The difference in discourse with respect to the same phenomenon suggests that the tension around commodification is not necessarily shaped uniformly across the national border. In this article, I juxtapose the contrasted discourses and policies on commercially arranged cross-border marriages in both countries and discuss the contexts that may have contributed to the difference in discourse. By doing this, I show that the global trend of commodification of intimacy and the cultural meaning of this phenomenon cannot be divorced from national politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper develops a simulation of Korean dairy policy that is tailored to the data, institutions, and policies in South Korea. It compares potential effects of changes in trade and domestic policy to baseline projections to 2015. Beverage milk continues to be supplied from domestic sources, implying imports compete in the manufacture of tradable products. We model manufactured dairy product supply, demand, and trade on a milk fat and non-fat-solid component basis reflecting product fungibility over the 10-year horizon used for our trade policy analysis. We find that if the domestic price support is removed with no change in trade policy, the market price of raw milk falls by about 2% and raw milk production declines by 4.5%. Under substantial tariff cuts of 30–40% with no effective change in domestic dairy policy, Korean fat and non-fat-solid prices fall by 7% and 11%, fat and non-fat-solid imports rise by 9% and 7% and Korea raw milk production falls by about 2% relative to the baseline. Prices of Korean farmer-owned dairy inputs, labor, and capital fall by about 1%. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]