Japan's farm minister mulls US visit to discuss global farm trade

TOKYO, Aug 15 (AFP) - Japanese farm minister Yoshiyuki Kamei said Friday he may visit the United States this month or next for talks on heated farm trade negotiations between member states of the World Trade Organization.

The consideration came a day after Japan voiced its dissatisfaction with a draft US-European Union proposal on freeing up some areas of agricultural trade, ahead of a WTO ministerial meeting in mid September in Cancun, Mexico.

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Kamei met with Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi Friday over the status of the WTO negotiations.

"I may have to visit the United States at the end of this month or early next month," Kamei told a group of reporters, after the meeting.

He said he hopes to hold talks with US cabinet level officials, Kyodo News and Jiji Press reported.

Kamei was unhappy with the draft US-EU proposal, saying Japan would "strongly" insist on its longtime protection of rice.

The farm minister said in a statement Thursday Tokyo opposed calls to lower tariffs on farm products, such as rice -- on which Japan imposes a tariff rate of 490 percent for imported rice, extremely high by global standards.

The new EU-US proposals contained no specific numbers on agricultural tariff cuts, and no timetable for phasing out agricultural subsidies.

The WTO talks have made little progress since the agenda was launched in November 2001 in the Qatari capital of Doha, missing a string of deadlines as deep differences persist on key issues.

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