State secretaries and parliamentary secretaries, both of which are political appointees, will set up a council at the Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Ministry to resolve key policy issues and problems, Toshikatsu Matsuoka, one of the ministry's two state secretaries, has told Kyodo News.

The plan is apparently intended to lessen reliance on and the influence of bureaucrats in policy formation. It calls for the officials to hold weekly meetings, with the first scheduled for early next week following the major government reorganization that took place Saturday.

There were no such forums in any ministry or agency before the reorganization. Some farm ministry bureaucrats called the initiative an attempt to create an extra organ, since there is already a top meeting for ministry officials.

The planned council will be led by Matsuoka and Naoki Tanaka, the ministry's other state secretary, as well as its two parliamentary secretaries, Eiko Kaneta and Masayuki Kunimasa, Matsuoka said in an interview.

Depending on the agenda, the council will call for participation of directors general from the Food, Forestry and Fisheries agencies and may include Agriculture Minister Yoshio Yatsu, according to Matsuoka.

State secretaries, who were formally called vice ministers before the government reorganization, have the power to act on behalf of Cabinet ministers. Parliamentary secretaries assist the minister and the state secretaries in forming policies. Among the key policy issues the farm ministry needs to tackle are ways to empower the nation's agriculture, forestry and fisheries industries and to boost Japan's self-sufficiency in foods.

They also include the formation of a policy to introduce income compensation plans for farming households as a way to increase large-scale farms.

The council will also need to address the critical issue of protecting rice growers from growing imports.