Farmers within a country are often protected by tariffs - that is, special taxes on imported food. Such policies are necessary, and should be implemented wherever possible. To what extent do you agree with this?

The question asks whether or not policies about special taxes, such as tariffs for farmers, should be implemented in different countries if it is possible. In my opinion, this policy should be used if they have the opportunity. First, such taxes prevent the population in countries to buy more imported food because this food will be more expensive due to taxes. If food produced outside the country, such as milk, rise in price customers would probably be more likely to purchase milk produced in their own country. For example, if the price of danish milk was 20NOK with the tariffs, and the Norwegian milk cost 22NOK, the majority of the customers would choose Norwegian milk. If we did not have tariffs on imported food, the price of these goods would be cheaper than domestic, and we would get fewer and fewer farmers. Secondly, it is important to protect farmers in our own country. Producing, for example, milk, oats and wheat on our own are key/crucial in case a crisis occurred. Then, we may not have the opportunity to import these types of goods, and in order to produce food, the farmers would have to do so. Therefore, it is important to maintain the production in our own country and make it easier for farmers to survive by implementing these kinds of taxes. To conclude, applying special taxes and similar policies are important to protect, not only the farmers but also other major parts of our society. This makes imported food more expensive, and help the domestic society.