Japan Hopes To Leave Farms Out Of U.S. Economic Talks

Japan will push to leave agriculture out of its first economic talks with the Trump administration next month, sources said, hoping to prevent thorny topics such as its heavily protected farm industry from blocking other negotiations, writes Yoshifumi Takemoto and Leika Kihara on Reuters.com.

Tokyo will propose an agenda for the dialogue in coming days, which will include a wide range of issues, such as how Japan can provide technical assistance for U.S. railway projects and increase imports of U.S. shale gas, government sources with knowledge of the matter said.

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Policymakers aim to focus the debate on ways to assist U.S. efforts to boost infrastructure investment, an area where an agreement may be more easily reached than other more contentious issues like trade, the sources said.

“We’ll go with areas where a deal may be easier, such as infrastructure projects,” a government official said on condition of anonymity. “Other issues may take more time.”

U.S. President Donald Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe agreed last month to launch a bilateral economic dialogue to discuss issues such as macroeconomic policies, trade and infrastructure investment.

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