国際備蓄構想とその食料市場安定化効果

Abstract

The Japanese MAFF has proposed the International Reserve Stock Concept among Asian Countries last spring. Following this proposal, the author has chaired the regular meetings for specialist-working-seminars and discussed on the effects of International Reserve Stock Policy on the staple food in terms of market stabilization and food shortage alleviation. This has two parts, one is a review of theoretical works and the other is policy simulation based on econometric models. From the review of theoretical works, it was pointed out that the price stabilization scheme has positive effects for all economic subjects such as consumers, producers and governments as a whole although the effect for each of these is not always positive in terms of economic surplus. From the policy simulation, it is pointed out that International Reserve Stock Policy can significantly mitigate the fluctuation of international rice price and its effect on the international price level is rather small. Moreover, the proposed policy has the effects to mitigate the fluctuation of food consumption in the developing countries and this effect is more significant when seasonal fluctuation in yield is serious. From the numerical analysis, it is shown that the export regulations in bad crop year by exporting countries amplify rice price fluctuation more seriously than other years. And also, international reserve stock policy can mitigate the price fluctuation most effectively in such occasion if the export market has oligopolistic structure where only a few exporters and many importers exist.