FAS/Seoul Monitoring of Media Reporting on Agricultural Issues

Today's Date:  Friday, February 20, 2015

For Coverage: February 1 ~ 20, 2015

 

 

1. ECONOMIC ISSUES

 

Inflation rate remains almost 0% for 2 months [Korean, HTJ]
http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=101&oid=020&aid=0002739235

SUMMARY:  According to the Consumer Inflation Trend from the Korean Customs Service, the inflation rate in January increased by 0.8% which recorded almost 0% for two months in a row.  In detail, normal product prices including oil, gas, and others have fallen down by 0.1%, while agricultural products, including pork and beef have risen by 0.7%.

 

2. LIVESTOCK ISSUES

 

A loophole in FMD vaccine efficacy test [Korean, HTJ]
http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=102&oid=056&aid=0010128468

SUMMARY: Doubt on vaccine’s efficacy is now arising among farmers.  Even though vaccination rate recorded 100%, 15 livestock farms have been infected with the FMD virus.  According to government report on vaccine’s efficacy, the experiment was conducted using contaminated swine and foreign virus samples, which is improper for testing.  A veterinary professor from Seoul National University said this vaccine should have not been approved because it contains unusual test results, showing government’s inappropriate guideline for vaccine testing.  One MAFRA official said that problems during vaccine testing have occurred not because of contaminated swine but because of unusual factors contained in the gnotobiotic pigs.

 

Migration limit for chickens in Seoul has been lifted [Korean, HTJ]
http://www.yonhapnews.co.kr/bulletin/2015/02/10/0200000000AKR20150210143100004.HTML

SUMMARY: The Seoul city government has lifted migration limits for chickens as of yesterday.  The Seoul city government has undergone investigation on all of the 650 chickens in the city for three days and confirmed that those chickens showed negative result against highly pathogenic avian influenza or HAPI.  They are now undergoing investigation on duck, and goose, and planning to decide whether to lift the migration limit or not depending on the test result.  Separately, the Seoul city government is planning to continue to fumigate habitats of wild birds.

 

FMD infected piglets shipped without declaration [Korean, HTJ]
http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=101&oid=034&aid=0002760772

SUMMARY: MAFRA announced that one farm owner shipped FMD suspicious piglets to other farms before declaring it as being suspicious.  This farm is located in Sejong city, which is currently within the livestock standstill area, growing about 600 heads of swine and some of them were actually FMD positive.  MAFRA is investigating the farm to see whether they violated the relevant laws or not during standstill period and plan to take related measures after it completes the investigation.

 

FMD and HPAI did not affect distribution industry thoroughly [Korean, HTJ]
http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=101&oid=003&aid=0006348207

SUMMARY: Distribution industry is nervous as FMD and HPAI spreads.  Recently, FMD was detected in Sejong city and HPAI also found in Seoul.  The distribution industry is now worried whether such situations will affect the consumers’ demand for these products before the Lunar New Year’s day marketing season.  However, consumers are relatively calm and even showed increased consumption in some of the items.  One big mart in Korea said that sales of pork and chicken during January 1^st to 8^th have increased by 17.1% and 148.6% respectively, compared to same period in last year.  One concerned person in the distribution industry said that it would be better to make a decision about this situation after the FMD and HPAI is eradicated, since high demand is remaining and immediate measures are undergoing.

 

FMD occurred in Hong-sung, the biggest livestock complex [Korean, HTJ]
http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=102&oid=277&aid=0003430061

SUMMARY: About 30 heads of swine from a farm in Hong-sung have been confirmed as FMD positive.    Hong-sung is the biggest livestock complex in Korea, growing over 488 thousand heads of swine in 70 farms.  Choong-chung-namdo, a province that is in charge of this city, has immediately vaccinated 250 thousand swine near the infected farm, but antibody formation rate was lower than expected.

 

‘Special cuts’ of Hanwoo are more popular than Hanwoo sirloin [Korean, HTJ]

http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=101&oid=034&aid=0002760010

SUMMARY: Sirloin, which was once the most popular Hanwoo cut for Koreans, is now decreasing in sales from originally 40% of total Hanwoo sales to below 30%.  Especially, sales of ‘Special cuts’ including flat iron and inside skirt of Hanwoo for roasting, rose up by 70% within a year.  Auction and gift set price of Hanwoo have respectively fallen down by 7% and 12% last year.

 

First HPAI occurred in Seoul [Korean, HTJ]

http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=102&oid=018&aid=0003179138

SUMMARY: QIA said that they confirmed the first HPAI case in the Seoul city area.  HPAI previously occured in Choong-chung and Gyunggi province.  This is the first case of H5N8 HPAI virus from wild birds in Seoul.  QIA also said that people need to be cautious of their individual sanitation and avoid directly touching wild birds,

 

Increasing quantities of imported meat [Korean, HTJ]
http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=101&oid=277&aid=0003428221

SUMMARY: According to KITA and USMEF, beef imports have increased by 4.53% last year, compared to 2013.  Australian beef recorded the highest import volume, followed by United States, New Zealand, and Canada.  The increate rate for pork was even faster than beef, which marked an increase of 23.9% last year compared to 2013.  U.S. pork recorded the highest import volume, followed by Germany, Spain, and Canada.  One MAFRA official said that domestic livestock farms are expected to suffer tremendous amount of damage in the next 15 years because of the FTA with Australia and Canada. 

 

A shortage in Quarantine officers have led to the FMD spread [Korean, HTJ]

http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=102&oid=022&aid=0002780595

SUMMARY: Six out of ten cases of FMD occurred in local cities where only one livestock quarantine officer is in charge.  According to MAFRA, a total of 73 FMD cases were detected in 16 regional cities.  Among them, 60.3% occurred where there was only one quarantine officer in charge and 26% of the cases occurred where two officers are in charge.  Only 13.7% (10 out of 73) FMD cases occurred where three officers are in charge.  One city official said that more officers are needed since one officer cannot cover all quarantine affairs during the FMD spreading season.

 

Agricultural prospect on livestock products [Korean, HTJ]

http://www.nongmin.com/article/ar_detail.htm?ar_id=247448&subMenu=articletotal

SUMMARY: According to KREI’s 2015 agricultural outlook, beef and milk products are expected to be deeply affected by FTA in the future.  Although Hanwoo production gradually decreased by -5.8% and the volume of imported beef has increased by 3.3% last year, the wholesale price of Hanwoo has increased by 4.2%.  The number of sows  increased by 2.1~4.1%, causing the total production to  increase by 3.1%.  Chicken production is expected to increase with increasing demand, leading to a price rise by 1~14%.

 

Over half of capital area residents eat chicken once a week [Korean, HTJ]
http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=101&oid=020&aid=0002740273

SUMMARY: According to Rural Development Administration (RDA)’s survey on chicken and duck meat consumption trend, 52.6% of capital area residents eat chicken once a week, with an annual per capita consumption of 12.45 kg.  The survey showed that 15.5% of residents even eat chicken more than three times a week.  For duck meat, 62% of respondents said they eat it once in every three months, with an annual per capita consumption of 3.46 kg.  Survey respondents also answered that they consider expiration date as the most important thing (4.18 out of 5 points) when they buy chicken, followed by country of origin (4.07), whether it is chilled or frozen (3.96) and quality of meat (3.90).

 

Price of Hanwoo going down despite decreasing number of Hanwoo [Korean, HTJ]

http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=101&oid=020&aid=0002740279

SUMMARY: Price of Hanwoo is now going down though the number of Hanwoo is decreasing.  According to the Korea Institute of Animal Products Quality Evaluation (KAPE), price of Hanwoo has dropped by 7%, even though it is getting close to the seasonal demand for Lunar New Year.    This phenomenon is due to decreased preference for Hanwoo sirloin, which is a criterion that is used for determining the slaughter number.  According to E-mart, one of biggest marts in Korea, sales of Hanwoo sirloin have dropped by 5.2% compared to last year.

 

New vaccine for FMD has been imported [Korean, HTJ]

http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=101&oid=034&aid=0002758501

SUMMARY: As the suspicion over the effectiveness of the current FMD vaccine due to the spreading of FMD, MAFRA has decided to immediately import new vaccine.  This new vaccine contains more various strains including ‘O 3039’ to deal with FMD virus than the original one.  MAFRA decided to vaccinate pork first, and then plan to import more vaccines if it is effective in dealing with the existing virus.

 

New type of PED vaccine is planned to be developed [Korean, HTJ]

http://www.nongmin.com/article/ar_detail.htm?ar_id=247381&subMenu=articletotal

SUMMARY: MAFRA is now trying to develop a new vaccine to deal with Porcine Epidemic Diarrhea (PED). A new type of PED has begun to occur since 2013 in Korea and there were 169 cases last year. One QIA official said that although PED virus is hard to segregate compared to other viruses, they will set up mid to long term plan to develop a new vaccine that can deal with the new type of PED virus. 

 

Imported beef and FMD puts livestock industry in trouble [Korean, HTJ]
http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=102&oid=421&aid=0001247046

SUMMARY: As FMD spreads and as consumer sentiment slow down, beef price is also going down gradually.  Also the livestock industry is expected to suffer additional pain from imports of Australian and U.S. beef as the import volume is expected to increase as the tariff continues to drop due to FTA.  According to Ahndong City in Korea, the price of beef unusually dropped despite the fact that it is before Lunar New year’s day, which is one of the biggest demand season.  One person working in the livestock industry said that even paying fixed cost to sustain the farm would become difficult if this situation continues.  He also added that governmental policies and farm’s planning including feed price reduction and quality improving is needed to solve this problem.

 

Pork price is expected to decrease this year [Korean, HTJ]

http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=101&oid=001&aid=0007389667

SUMMARY: According to MAFRA’s ‘Agricultural prospect’ briefing, pork price is expected to decrease dramatically due to increased number of swine and piglet.  Price of carcass is expected to drop by 11.6%.  The briefing material also included projections for price fluctuation in other agricultural products.  Wholesale price of Hanwoo is expected to increase by 4.2%, while total production value of livestock industry is projected to drop 3.4%.  Rice production is expected to increase to 4 million MT, while cultivation area is expected to decrease by 1.8%.  MAFRA said that the total agricultural production value is expected to decrease by 2.1% due to slow economic recovery, while individual agricultural income is expected to increase by 2.2% compared to last year.

 

FMD and radiation spill may shrink consumption [Korean, HTJ]

http://www.ekn.kr/news/article.html?no=121527

SUMMARY: The price of major agricultural products is fluctuating as Lunar New Year’s Day approaches.  According to Lotte-mart, one of the biggest hypermarket in Korea, the average price of fishery products used as presents have dropped by 48.1% while the price of beef have increased by 34.4%.  According to the Korean Consumer Agency (KCA), nine out of ten Korean customers are worried about consuming fishery products after the Japanese radiation spill.  According to the research conducted by Trend Monitor, a market research institute, 35.8% of respondents said they are consuming lower amount of beef after the FMD outbreak, making it difficult to project the demand and price of beef.

 

Livestock industry output is expected to decline [SYH]

http://www.foodnews.co.kr/news/articleView.html?idxno=53811

According to Korean Rural Economic Institute’s newly released prospect report, not only this year’s gross agricultural output is expected to decline by 2.1% compared to last year’s but also gross livestock industry output is expected to decline. However, even with all the reduction, the international crude oil prices have dropped which will lead to the reduction of the materials price and the alleviation of the burden of working expenses. Hence the income is expected to be increased.

Prevention of epidemics [SYH]

http://www.foodnews.co.kr/news/articleView.html?idxno=53755

The Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs has declared that there are going to be some revisions on the stock raising laws to improve the effectiveness of prevention of epidemics. In order to improve the standards for livestock industry’s permission and prevent domestic animals from disease, they have decided to adopt the tougher laws and regulations on disinfection.

 

FDA is planning to enhance the supervision of hygiene among the livestock industries [SYH]

http://www.foodnews.co.kr/news/articleView.html?idxno=53865

The Korea Food and Drug Administration supervised 83 food industries last month and found out that 15 industries out of 83 have violated the livestock hygiene management law. They strongly requested for administrative measure for the violation. They are planning to enhance their supervision to prevent the falsification of expiration date and origin of the country, and illegal distribution.

 

3. MARKETING ISSUES

 

Direct Purchase from Foreign On-line Shop is 26 Percent Cheaper than Purchase from Local Shop, Godiva Chocolate [Korean, OSY]

http://news.donga.com/3/all/20150211/69584974/1

Summary: Korea Consumer Institute (KCI) claimed that its recent survey confirmed that retail price of imported consumer foods in general in Korea was much higher than in foreign country.  As an example, KCI pointed out that Godiva chocolate was 26 percent cheaper (inclusive of shipping cost) if purchased from foreign on-line shop.  Other leading imported confectionery products popular in Korea also showed similar price differential in the survey, KCI added.

 

Department Store Industry Reports Sales Decline for the First Time in 11 Years ... Consumers Move to Mobile Shopping & Foreign On-line Shopping [Korean, OSY]

http://news.donga.com/3/all/20150209/69541224/1

Summary: According to Korea Statistics Service (KTS), cash register sales of department store industry amounted to 29.2 trillion won in 2014, down 1.9 percent from the previous year.  Last time that the industry saw a negative annual sales growth was 11 years ago.  Industry analysts point out that rapid growth of on-line retail channels, particularly mobile shopping over smart phone as well as consumers' direct purchase from foreign on-line retailers through freight-forwarding service providers, is the main reason for reduced consumer traffic to local department stores.

 

Korea-EU Equivalency Agreement on Processed Organic Food Takes Effect on February 1, 2015 [Korean, OSY]

http://www.enviagro.go.kr/portal/content/html/import/eu.jsp

Summary: Korea and European Union (EU) signed an agreement that will allow certified processed organic foods from originating countries (Korea and 28 countries under EU) to enter counterpart country without additional local organic certification.  The agreement has taken effect on February 1, 2015.  As a result, processed organic foods, originating from EU with EU's organic certification, are allowed to be labeled and marketed as 'organic' food in Korea.

 

4. NORTH KOREA ISSUES

 

FAO plans to aid DPRK with over 4 million U.S. dollars [Korean, HTJ]

http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=100&oid=001&aid=0007397635

SUMMARY: Radio Free Asia (RFA) reported today that FAO set a budget of 4.27 million U.S. dollar to aid DPRK, consisting of 2.25 million dollars for facility support programs and 2.02 million dollars for technical cooperation programs, respectively.  The facility support programs are focusing mainly on potatoes storage management and greenhouse equipment for winter crops under the Food Security Cooperate Fund made by EU and Sweden.  The technical cooperation programs include the prevention of spreading out FMD and AI, reservation facilities of forest resources and repair of agricultural products storage.  An FAO researcher said that they are focusing on aids to solve DPRK’s food shortage problem.

 

DPRK’s individual food calorie remains still for 50 years [Korean, HTJ]

http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=100&oid=421&aid=0001247815

SUMMARY: Voice of America (VOA) quoted National Geographic’s research that essential calories for individual DPRK nations are almost same as that of 50 years ago.  VOA especially pointed out that most of the DPRK’s calorie consumption comes from over 60% of grains including rice and corn, which is higher than that of India’s 57%, which is a religious nation.  On the other hand, the ratio of calorie consumption in South Korea that comes from grains dropped from 82% in 1961 to 43% in 2011.

 

5. OTHER MISCELLANEOUS ISSUES

 

Coffee import has drastically increased [Korean, HTJ]
http://news.naver.com/main/read.nhn?mode=LSD&mid=shm&sid1=101&oid=034&aid=0002755492

SUMMARY: Import quantity of coffee recorded the biggest increase last year.  According to Korean Customs and coffee industry, coffee beans and other preparations have increased by 14.8% last year, compared to that of 2013.   This imported quantity is among the biggest after the record level in 2011.  Total import value has even increased by 18.2% within a year.  This appears to be due to the increasing coffee demand in the domestic market, drop in imported coffee price as a result of the KORUS FTA and increasing number of coffee shops in Korea. 

 

Radiation inspection, traceability system for fishery foods will expand [Korean, HTJ]

http://news1.kr/articles/?2070043

SUMMARY: The food safety management of fishery products is expected to be improved.  The Ministry of Ocean and Fisheries (MOF) announced yesterday that they will improve the food safety of fishery products by expanding the number of key control items to be added to the seafood traceability system.  They also plan to expand mandatory country of origin labeling  on products, as well as improve radiation inspection of fishery products.  One MOF official said that MOF is now restricting fishery import from Japan and also conducting extra inspections on fishery products from other regions.

 

Agricultural imports increases [Korean, HTJ]
http://www.nongmin.com/article/ar_detail.htm?ar_id=247157&subMenu=articletotal

SUMMARY: Total value of imported agricultural products recorded the highest level last year.  The total amount to be provided as FTA direct payment is also expected to increase due to increased import (15%) from FTA countries.  According to KREI, total import volume of agricultural products recorded the highest level last year, an increase of 5%.  Domestic agricultural products are expected to suffer from the increase in imports, leading to an increase in FTA direct payments.  One congressman said that the government should relieve the standard for receiving direct payment so that more farmers can be compensated for their lose coming from increased imports due to FTA.