South Korea Maintains Developing Nation Status to Protect Agriculture Sector

It is things like South Korea claiming they are a developing country that gives weight to President Trump’s frequent criticisms of how these international organizations are unfair to American workers:

South Korea’s new agriculture minister has ruled out the possibility of abandoning the country’s special and differential treatment under the World Trade Organization regime, despite growing U.S. pressure to reform the global trade body.

In a recent brief comment to Yonhap News Agency, Kim Hyeon-soo said that South Korea has no plan to give up developing country status, underscoring the country’s efforts to keep the status intact, mainly to protect its sensitive agriculture industry, especially rice.

Currently, Asia’s fourth-largest economy imposes a 513 percent tariff on imported rice. Government data showed 54 percent of the 1 million South Korean farming households grow rice, a staple food for Koreans.

Yonhap

South Korea is one of the most developed and maybe even the most technologically advanced country I have ever been to and to claim they are a developing nation is ridiculous. President Trump is threatening to unilaterally consider South Korea and other nations in the WTO as developed nations if the WTO does not change its developing nation criteria.