Japan | Pork Safeguard In Force August 1 | Japan’s pork safeguard will be i...
Japan
Pork Safeguard In Force August 1
Japan’s pork safeguard will be imposed starting August 1, Japan’s Finance Ministry announced today (July 29).
The Japanese Pork Safeguard triggers when the cumulative quantity of imports on a quarterly basis exceeds by 19 percent the average level of the corresponding quarters in the three previous Japan fiscal years. The average level of imports for the first quarter of JFY 1999, 2000, and 2001 was 173,981 metric tons (mt). From April to June, Japan imported a total of 216,854 mt of pork, mainly from the United States, Canada and Denmark.
The Safeguard system was designed to protect the domestic pork industry from volatile surges in imported pork. Recent trade patterns, however, suggest that the system actually encourages import surges when traders believe that triggering is imminent.
For a graph showing monthly imports of pork into Japan and the prominent spikes in trade when the Safeguard is about to be triggered, please see the following link.
http://www.usmef.org/Misc_News/02_SafeguardGraphs_2.pdf
For background information about the Japanese Pork Safeguard, please see the USDA July 2001 publication, Japan's Safeguard on Pork Imports, at:
http://www.fas.usda.gov/dlp/highlights/2001/japansafeguard.pdf.