TOKYO, Japan (Reuters) — Japan will expand handouts to beef and pork farmers by raising the percentage of losses covered by the government to 90 percent from 80 percent.
According to a draft of the policy outline for the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, the government will also increase purchases of do-mestic rice for reserve stocks to prevent prices from falling because of new tariff-free import quotas from the United States and Australia under TPP.
The steps are expected to ease farmers’ worries over TPP and an increase in imports of cheaper foreign farm products. The TPP pact still requires ratification by member countries.
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The draft also said Japan aims to raise the value of farm and fishery product exports to US$8 billion before an initial target year of 2020, compared to about $5 billion last year.
The country also wants to attract 20 million foreign visitors a year before and wants to see their annual spending hit $32 billion, according to the draft.
In a separate package of steps to tackle Japan’s shrinking population, the government will provide support for single-parent households and families with more than one child, government sources said.
The government is expected to include these measures in a supplementary budget for this fiscal year and in an initial budget for the next fiscal year starting from April.
Prime minister Shinzo Abe has been trying to demonstrate re-newed commitment to fixing the economy with three new policy “arrows,” which aides say subsume an original trio of hyper-easy monetary policy, public spending and reform.
Those targets include boosting the fertility rate to 1.8 from the current 1.42 so Japan can keep its population from falling below 100 million, supporting those who need to care for elderly relatives and expanding the economy by one-fifth to $5 trillion.
The package of steps includes measures to reduce household burdens on preschool education to provide “seamless support” from pregnancy to birth to child rearing, the sources said.
The government will also promote special nursing care homes for the aged to eliminate the need to quit work to care for elderly relatives and enhance productivity of the nursing care business.
