Food Security Problems in North-East Asia and Cooperative Measures in the 21st Century

21세기 동북아 식량안보문제와 지역간 협력방안

The issue of food security will become one of the most widely concerned area of public policy in North East Asia coming 21st century. Although those countries such as China, Japan, South and North Koreas and Mongolia places emphasis on the need to have stable and reliable capacity for food production, it will be highly possible for these regions to experience the shortage of food supply due to growing population, expanding urbanization and rapid industrialization within next decade. Since world food markets are characterized as unstable structure and dominated by large multinational firms, their reliances on importing staple food may create the aggravation of food shortage problem in emergency situations. One possible proposal for solving food security in north-east region might be movements toward multilateral food supply assurance agreements as a component of trade negotiations among these countries. As measures for cooperation for securing food supply in these regions, following principles would be suggested; 1) encouraging agricultural cooperation based on private business, 2) exchange of technical and human resources rather than material support, 3) developing mutual concern and benefits, 4) managing joint buffer stock for staple food.