농업보조금 개편 방안 연구

Abstract

농업보조금은 농업생산기반 조성, 기술개발 투자, 농업경쟁력 제고 등을 위한 필수 요소이다. 보조금 지원을 통해 농업경영체의 수익성이 제고되고, 대외 경쟁력을 향상시키며, 소비자의 후생을 증대시키는 등 긍정적 효과를 유발한다. 그러나 다른 한편으로 보조금 지원에 따른 농가의 정부 의존적 영농, 구조조정의 지연, 일부 농산물의 생산과잉 초래 등 자원배분의 비효율성과 당초 목표 대비 성과의 부족과 같은 문제점도 있다. 이 연구는 농업보조금과 관련한 쟁점을 정리하고, 보조사업의 효율성 제고를 위한 방향 제시를 목적으로 수행하였다. 구체적으로는 첫째, 농업보조금의 일반적 개념과 WTO의 농업보조금 분류 내역을 정리하고, WTO 규정에 따른 국내보조금 운용 현황과 방향을 제시하였다. 둘째, 농업보조금 현황과 개선과제를 도출하고, 개편방향을 제시하였다. 셋째, 농업예산 규모의 적정성을 검토하였다. 넷째, 농업보조금 개편의 주요 쟁점으로 농업부문 직접지불제, 개별보조사업 그리고 보조금 집행 관리 체계의 개편 방안을 제시하였다.

This study is aimed to suggest how to improve performance and efficiency of government subsidy programs for agricultural sector. More specifically, it is designed to address followings: First, general definition of agricultural support and the classified catalogue of WTO domestic support are reviewed. Second, the current status of agricultural support is examined and a direction of its reform is proposed. Third, an appropriate size of agricultural support is considered. Finally, it suggests ways to revamp direct payments, individual subsidy programs, and the management system of implementing agricultural support, which are major issues in the agricultrual support reform.

Agricultural subsidies have brought about a set of positive effects on competitiveness, SOC, R&D, and restructuring in the sector, even though too many subsidy programs, each having different goal and target and inefficiency of their implementation have been pinpointed as shortcomings.

However, agricultural subsidies have also produced some adverse effects on the sector. First, they have spurred dependence on government aids and weaken farmers' ability to stand on their own. Second, problems associated with direct payment are pointed out, including its concentration on rice and paddy field, overproduction of rice, a lack of incentive for upland field corps which are in short of production. Third, the projects as FTA countermeasures have so high portion of support, 74.4% that much concern is being voiced about deepening dependence on government and excess demand for the pojects. Fourth, there exist inefficient factors in the management system of budget and fund. Finally, government-oriented fiscal funds would stand in the way of private investment in agriculture.

This study focuses on the reforms of direct payments, individual subsidy programs, and their implementing system. The principle of the reforms is based on the consensus from the 'Committee of Advanced Agriculture and Fishery(2009.07)'. Each subsidy program is reconsidered to determine whether it should be abolished, be integrated with other program, be changed to loan program, or be adjusted with lower share of support, and so on.

In this stage, the reform of agricultural direct payments would be conducted focusing on the modification of rice direct payment. In order to mitigate overproduction of rice, the variable payment needs to be coupled with production costs. The newly discussed public-service direct payment is not widely shared opinions yet and would be difficult in securing enough fund for implementation. However, in the near future when further opening of domestic agriculture starts to lower profitability of upland crops, a com- prehensive reform of agricultural direct payments will be required.

Researchers: Seong-jae Park, Joon-kee Park, Ju-ho Song, Gwang-seok Chae, Han-pil Moon Research period: 2010. 12. - 2011. 1. E-mail address: seongjae@krei.re.kr