Green Box In Foreign Agriculture: Experience And Using It For Reference

Agriculture in China is integrating the international world after accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO). In order to accelerate the development of agriculture and improve its competitiveness, it is imperative to establish a domestic support system with Chinese characteristics according to the rule of WTO. Consequently, it is significant for adjusting our agricultural policies to summarize experiences about executing Green Box in foreign countries and to learn from others' strong points to offset our weakness.With the abundant documents about agricultural domestic support in different countries, this article calculates the level of Green Box since 1995 and concludes the general characteristics of Green Box in the developed countries (including United States, European Union, Japan, Canada and Australia) and the developing countries (inpluding Korea, Brazil, Argentina, Mexico and India). The level of Green Box from 1996 to 2002 in China is also computed on the basis of improved method for policy classification. The main conclusions are as follows: (1) the performance of agricultural policy reform is not outstanding in developed countries since Uruguay Round. The levels of Green Box are becoming higher, and the measures adopted are more complicated and more versatile than before because a great of support in Amber Box are converted into Green Box in these countries. (2) the developing countries are still embarrassed to implement Green Box for poor finance. The level of Green Box not only is low but also fluctuates frequently, and the measures available to them are limited. The design of programs in Green Box in Agricultural Agreement also goes against advancing the reform of agricultural policy in developing countries. (3) whether the market-oriented reform is advocated in agricultural policy greatly depends on the current level and the structure of domestic support. We should insist on capping the level of Green Box and developing a Green Box system in favor of the agricultural policy reform in developing countries. (4) the level of Green Box in China is higher than common developing countries, but far behind such developed countries as U.S., Japan, etc. Furthermore, there exist many problems of Green Box in China, for example, inharmonious structure, lack of measures and low efficiency in management. (5) considering economic development and agricultural resources in China, the adjustment of Green Box should facilitate its stability,and improve its structure, and promote its efficiency, instead of seeking high support levelblindly.Therefore, we must adjust the Green Box fully considering the situation of our country to enhance the general productivity of agriculture and the international competitiveness of agricultural products. The details of suggestion are as follows: (1) to keep the investment for agriculture from the central government steadily increasing through legislation. (2) to adjust the system of public stockholding for grains to improve the efficiency of fund utilization. (3) to implement the strategy of agricultural structural adjustment according to comparative advantage. (4) to attach great importance to agricultural research, agricultural technological extension and peasants' training. Allocate more funds to them. (5) to improve the standardization system of agricultural products and the sanitary and phyto-sanitary system. (6) to change the direction of investment for infrastructure. (7) to increase the investment for ecological environmental. (8) to set up the insurance system for agricultural products. (9) to consolidate the system of information service for agriculture. (10) to establish farmers' cooperation organization and speed the industrialization of agriculture.