During meetings in Tokyo, Trade Minister, Mark Vaile, urged Japan to undertake far-reaching trade reform in the new WTO round to be launched at Seattle later this year. On Monday, Mr Vaile met with the Japanese Minister for International Trade and Industry, Mr Kaoru Yosano. He also met with Mr Takashi Fukaya, who has been appointed to succeed Mr Yosano as MITI Minister following the Japanese Cabinet reshuffle. "I assured Japan of Australia's commitment to achieve results in a three-year timeframe in the WTO talks", Mr Vaile said. "Australia believes that Japan, as a country which historically has benefited enormously from the openness of other economies, should take a lead in forthcoming WTO negotiations". "I also left a strong message that Australia, as chair of the Cairns Group, expects Japan to liberalise its agricultural imports further". Mr Vaile said that while Japan was a large and valuable market for Australian agricultural exports, those exports would significantly expand if Japan opened its market further. "We see no justifiable reason why agriculture should be treated differently from trade in manufactured goods and services", Mr Vaile said. Mr Vaile also took the opportunity to brief both Mr Yosano and Mr Fukaya on the announcement last Friday by Ministers from ASEAN and the Closer Economic Relations (CER) countries of Australia and New Zealand to conduct a feasibility study on an AFTA-CER free trade area by 2010. In meetings in Japan, Mr Vaile has also encouraged Japan to continue the restructuring and deregulation of Japan's industry.
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