South Korean Cultural Ecology - 1905 to 1990
Part 3: The Plight of the Farmers - Page 22

G. The Rice Problems

The Korean government, in order to keep grain prices low to blunt economic and political discontent in the cities over higher cost of living, imported massive amounts of rice from the U.S. that depressed the price of rice below the cost of production in Korea. The massive migration of poor rural workers to the cities combined with low grain prices made the export-driven low-labor-cost industrialization possible. Korean rice costs are 5 to 10 times the world price of rice. To forestall a rising discontent and an uprising by farmers in 1971, the government instituted a policy of buying rice at high prices from the farmers and selling it to the city workers at a low price. The strain on the budget came to $686 million or 34% of the Korean deficit. In 1992 the government spent over $8 billion on policies designed to support 1.2 million families growing rice.

Next the government introduced a new variety of miracle rice, Indica. This was touted worldwide as the panacea for all the problems, from low rural incomes to food deficits to political instability. A program of incentives laced with coercion was instituted. By 1977, 70 percent of paddy rice was the new variety. To meet quotas, agricultural officials resorted to rooting out fields planted with the old varieties. The new varieties did yield great crops, but it also required higher costs in the form of additional fertilizers and pesticides. Application of fertilizer per hectare rose from 162 kilograms in 1970 to 299 kilograms in 1980. Pesticide use rose by 330% between 1974 and 1976. This was a tremendous increase in cost to the farmer and accounted for the average liability per farm to rise nearly 8 times, from 14,000 won to 111,061 won.

This fiasco with the new rice not only buried the farmer in debt, but it turned out to be highly susceptible to disease and encountered great resistance from the consumer who preferred the old varieties. (When will bureaucrats realize that farmers plant certain varieties for real reasons)? Both the farmers and the consumers turned their backs on the bureaucrats' choice. Consumers were willing to pay a premium price on the old varieties and farmers went back to planting the old varieties. In 1979 the traditional rice accounted for a third of the paddy-land and by 1985 it was three quarters of the paddy-land. In 1988 a farmers' demonstration in front of the National assembly turned into a riot. Korea's ruling elite who had relied on the farmer's support to stay in power was faced with a class that was shaking off government control and organizing as an independent political force.