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Japan Today
06-07-2025
- Business
- Japan Today
In reversal, Japan now wants rice farmers to produce more. Will it work?
By Kaori Kaneko For more than half a century, the Japanese government has encouraged its rice farmers to grow less of the crop so that prices of the national staple grain remained relatively high and steady. Now, under an ambitious agricultural policy announced this year, Tokyo is preparing for a reversal, envisaging a future of bountiful output that would secure the country's food security without sending prices into freefall and hurting its politically influential farmers. The new direction has taken on an unexpected urgency as Japanese grapple with a shortage of the all-important staple, which has prompted a historic spike in prices, a flood of imports, and interest from President Donald Trump, who has renewed pressure on Japan to buy U.S. rice as part of the allies' elusive trade deal. Kazuhachi Hosaka looks at his rice farm in Joetsu, Niigata Prefecture. Image: REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon It is a policy that many farmers like Kazuhachi Hosaka welcome in principle, but with trepidation because questions over how it would work in practice remain unanswered. The government is aiming to complete a roadmap by the middle of next year. "We'd want the government to make sure there's some kind of a safety net for producers," Hosaka said at his farm in the northern prefecture of Niigata. "It's easy enough to switch rice for feed or processed foods to staple rice. But tilling land for new paddies or switching from wheat or soybeans would require labour, machinery and all kinds of investments." This year, Hosaka allocated all but 10 hectares (25 acres) of his 180-hectare land for staple rice, reducing feed-use rice by 20 hectares given the attractive prices. But he worries that prices could plunge if Japan's overall production goes unchecked under the new policy, set to be implemented from the 2027 crop year. "I do feel conflicted," Hosaka said about the doubling of retail rice prices to above 4,000 yen for a 5kg bag this year in what has turned into a national crisis. "It's important that rice prices settle at levels acceptable to both producers and consumers," he said. Hosaka hopes prices would stabilise around 3,000 to 3,500 yen - a level Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba also hopes would be palatable for voters. Supermarket prices fell for a fifth straight week, to 3,801 yen in the seven days to June 22, but were still 70% higher than the same period last year. Rice paddies in Joetsu, Niigata Prefecture Image: REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon NATIONAL CRISIS For Japanese people, rice is more than just a staple food. Cultivated in the country for more than 2,000 years, rice is considered sacred in the indigenous Shinto religion and is deeply ingrained in local tradition and culture. The Japanese are famously proud of their short-grain Japonica variety, protecting the market with trade barriers. So when rice turned into a luxury item this year, consumers fumed and policymakers - facing imminent elections - worried. With an eye on voters ahead of an upper house election on July 20, the government has been releasing emergency rice from its stockpile to sell for about 2,000 yen per 5 kg. Farmers - also traditionally an important voting bloc for Ishiba's Liberal Democratic Party - were told it was a dire but necessary move to protect Japan's food security and prevent consumers from switching permanently away from homegrown rice. But for most of the past 50 years, Japan has poured its energy into doing the opposite: providing subsidies to farmers to grow crops other than staple rice so as to prevent oversupply and a fall in prices. That system backfired last year when the farm ministry misread supply from the heat-damaged 2023 harvest, resulting in a severe shortage in August. The ensuing surge in prices made Japan an anomaly against a fall in global prices, and exposed the risks of its approach. The new policy, if successful, would prevent a recurrence by allocating 350,000 tons of rice for export in 2030 - an eight-fold jump from 45,000 tons last year - that could be redirected to the domestic market in the event of a shortage, the government says. Some agricultural experts say the policy is unrealistic. The idea of selling expensive Japanese rice abroad is counterintuitive, especially when even Japan is importing record amounts of the grain despite the 341 yen per kg levy that had previously priced foreign products out of the market. Japanese have also acquired a taste for U.S. Calrose rice, while imports from Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam have also been popular with businesses and cost-conscious consumers. "Expensive rice might sell to niche markets, but getting that up to 350,000 tons would require price competitiveness, and there's a long way for that," said Kazunuki Ohizumi, professor emeritus at Miyagi University and an expert on agricultural management. The government aims to provide some form of support but also expects farmers to make their own efforts to consolidate, and make use of artificial intelligence and other technologies to lower production costs. Meanwhile, Hosaka said, prices of fertilizers, pesticides and fuel have shot up, sending production costs through the roof. "It's tough," he said. "The government has released quite a bit of stockpiled rice, so I'm very worried about prices falling even further." © Thomson Reuters 2025.
Asahi Shimbun
04-07-2025
- Business
- Asahi Shimbun
In reversal, Japan now wants rice farmers to produce more. Will it work?
JOETSU, Niigata Prefecture--For more than half a century, the Japanese government has encouraged its rice farmers to grow less of the crop so that prices of the national staple grain remained relatively high and steady. Now, under an ambitious agricultural policy announced this year, Tokyo is preparing for a reversal, envisaging a future of bountiful output that would secure the country's food security without sending prices into freefall and hurting its politically influential farmers. The new direction has taken on an unexpected urgency as Japanese grapple with a shortage of the all-important staple, which has prompted a historic spike in prices, a flood of imports, and interest from President Donald Trump, who has renewed pressure on Japan to buy U.S. rice as part of the allies' elusive trade deal. It is a policy that many farmers like Kazuhachi Hosaka welcome in principle, but with trepidation because questions over how it would work in practice remain unanswered. The government is aiming to complete a roadmap by the middle of next year. "We'd want the government to make sure there's some kind of a safety net for producers," Hosaka said at his farm in the northern prefecture of Niigata. "It's easy enough to switch rice for feed or processed foods to staple rice. But tilling land for new paddies or switching from wheat or soybeans would require labor, machinery and all kinds of investments." This year, Hosaka allocated all but 10 hectares (25 acres) of his 180-hectare land for staple rice, reducing feed-use rice by 20 hectares given the attractive prices. But he worries that prices could plunge if Japan's overall production goes unchecked under the new policy, set to be implemented from the 2027 crop year. "I do feel conflicted," Hosaka said about the doubling of retail rice prices to above 4,000 yen ($27.80) for a 5kg bag this year in what has turned into a national crisis. "It's important that rice prices settle at levels acceptable to both producers and consumers," he said. Hosaka hopes prices would stabilize around 3,000 to 3,500 yen - a level Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba also hopes would be palatable for voters. Supermarket prices fell for a fifth straight week, to 3,801 yen in the seven days to June 22, but were still 70% higher than the same period last year. NATIONAL CRISIS For Japanese people, rice is more than just a staple food. Cultivated in the country for more than 2,000 years, rice is considered sacred in the indigenous Shinto religion and is deeply ingrained in local tradition and culture. The Japanese are famously proud of their short-grain Japonica variety, protecting the market with trade barriers. So when rice turned into a luxury item this year, consumers fumed and policymakers - facing imminent elections - worried. With an eye on voters ahead of an upper house election on July 20, the government has been releasing emergency rice from its stockpile to sell for about 2,000 yen ($13.83) per 5 kg (11 pounds). Farmers - also traditionally an important voting bloc for Ishiba's Liberal Democratic Party - were told it was a dire but necessary move to protect Japan's food security and prevent consumers from switching permanently away from homegrown rice. But for most of the past 50 years, Japan has poured its energy into doing the opposite: providing subsidies to farmers to grow crops other than staple rice so as to prevent oversupply and a fall in prices. That system backfired last year when the farm ministry misread supply from the heat-damaged 2023 harvest, resulting in a severe shortage in August. The ensuing surge in prices made Japan an anomaly against a fall in global prices, and exposed the risks of its approach. The new policy, if successful, would prevent a recurrence by allocating 350,000 tons of rice for export in 2030 - an eight-fold jump from 45,000 tons last year - that could be redirected to the domestic market in the event of a shortage, the government says. Some agricultural experts say the policy is unrealistic. The idea of selling expensive Japanese rice abroad is counterintuitive, especially when even Japan is importing record amounts of the grain despite the 341 yen per kg levy that had previously priced foreign products out of the market. Japanese have also acquired a taste for U.S. Calrose rice, while imports from Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam have also been popular with businesses and cost-conscious consumers. "Expensive rice might sell to niche markets, but getting that up to 350,000 tons would require price competitiveness, and there's a long way for that," said Kazunuki Ohizumi, professor emeritus at Miyagi University and an expert on agricultural management. The government aims to provide some form of support but also expects farmers to make their own efforts to consolidate, and make use of artificial intelligence and other technologies to lower production costs. Meanwhile, Hosaka said, prices of fertilizers, pesticides and fuel have shot up, sending production costs through the roof. "It's tough," he said. "The government has released quite a bit of stockpiled rice, so I'm very worried about prices falling even further."
The Star
04-07-2025
- Business
- The Star
In reversal, Japan now wants rice farmers to produce more. Will it work?
JOETSU, Japan: For more than half a century, the Japanese government has encouraged its rice farmers to grow less of the crop so that prices of the national staple grain remained relatively high and steady. Now, under an ambitious agricultural policy announced this year, Tokyo is preparing for a reversal, envisaging a future of bountiful output that would secure the country's food security without sending prices into freefall and hurting its politically influential farmers. The new direction has taken on an unexpected urgency as Japanese grapple with a shortage of the all-important staple, which has prompted a historic spike in prices, a flood of imports, and interest from President Donald Trump, who has renewed pressure on Japan to buy US rice as part of the allies' elusive trade deal. It is a policy that many farmers like Kazuhachi Hosaka welcome in principle, but with trepidation because questions over how it would work in practice remain unanswered. The government is aiming to complete a roadmap by the middle of next year. "We'd want the government to make sure there's some kind of a safety net for producers," Hosaka said at his farm in the northern prefecture of Niigata. "It's easy enough to switch rice for feed or processed foods to staple rice. But tilling land for new paddies or switching from wheat or soybeans would require labour, machinery and all kinds of investments." This year, Hosaka allocated all but 10 hectares (25 acres) of his 180-hectare land for staple rice, reducing feed-use rice by 20 hectares given the attractive prices. But he worries that prices could plunge if Japan's overall production goes unchecked under the new policy, set to be implemented from the 2027 crop year. "I do feel conflicted," Hosaka said about the doubling of retail rice prices to above 4,000 yen (US$27.80) for a 5kg bag this year in what has turned into a national crisis. "It's important that rice prices settle at levels acceptable to both producers and consumers," he said. Hosaka hopes prices would stabilise around 3,000 to 3,500 yen - a level Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba also hopes would be palatable for voters. Supermarket prices fell for a fifth straight week, to 3,801 yen in the seven days to June 22, but were still 70% higher than the same period last year. For Japanese people, rice is more than just a staple food. Cultivated in the country for more than 2,000 years, rice is considered sacred in the indigenous Shinto religion and is deeply ingrained in local tradition and culture. The Japanese are famously proud of their short-grain Japonica variety, protecting the market with trade barriers. So when rice turned into a luxury item this year, consumers fumed and policymakers - facing imminent elections - worried. With an eye on voters ahead of an upper house election on July 20, the government has been releasing emergency rice from its stockpile to sell for about 2,000 yen ($13.83) per 5 kg. Farmers - also traditionally an important voting bloc for Ishiba's Liberal Democratic Party - were told it was a dire but necessary move to protect Japan's food security and prevent consumers from switching permanently away from homegrown rice. But for most of the past 50 years, Japan has poured its energy into doing the opposite: providing subsidies to farmers to grow crops other than staple rice so as to prevent oversupply and a fall in prices. That system backfired last year when the farm ministry misread supply from the heat-damaged 2023 harvest, resulting in a severe shortage in August. The ensuing surge in prices made Japan an anomaly against a fall in global prices, and exposed the risks of its approach. The new policy, if successful, would prevent a recurrence by allocating 350,000 tonnes of rice for export in 2030 - an eight-fold jump from 45,000 tonnes last year - that could be redirected to the domestic market in the event of a shortage, the government says. Some agricultural experts say the policy is unrealistic. The idea of selling expensive Japanese rice abroad is counterintuitive, especially when even Japan is importing record amounts of the grain despite the 341 yen per kg levy that had previously priced foreign products out of the market. Japanese have also acquired a taste for US Calrose rice, while imports from Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam have also been popular with businesses and cost-conscious consumers. "Expensive rice might sell to niche markets, but getting that up to 350,000 tonnes would require price competitiveness, and there's a long way for that," said Kazunuki Ohizumi, professor emeritus at Miyagi University and an expert on agricultural management. The government aims to provide some form of support but also expects farmers to make their own efforts to consolidate, and make use of artificial intelligence and other technologies to lower production costs. Meanwhile, Hosaka said, prices of fertilisers, pesticides and fuel have shot up, sending production costs through the roof. "It's tough," he said. "The government has released quite a bit of stockpiled rice, so I'm very worried about prices falling even further." - Reuters
Straits Times
04-07-2025
- Business
- Straits Times
In reversal, Japan now wants rice farmers to produce more. Will it work?
Sign up now: Get ST's newsletters delivered to your inbox For Japanese people, rice is more than just a staple food. For more than half a century, the Japanese government has encouraged its rice farmers to grow less of the crop so that prices of the national staple grain remained relatively high and steady. Now, under an ambitious agricultural policy announced in 2025, Tokyo is preparing for a reversal, envisaging a future of bountiful output that would secure the country's food security without sending prices into freefall and hurting its politically influential farmers. The new direction has taken on an unexpected urgency as Japanese grapple with a shortage of the all-important staple, which has prompted a historic spike in prices, a flood of imports, and interest from President Donald Trump, who has renewed pressure on Japan to buy US rice as part of the allies' elusive trade deal. It is a policy that many farmers like Kazuhachi Hosaka welcome in principle, but with trepidation because questions over how it would work in practice remain unanswered. The government is aiming to complete a roadmap by the middle of 2026. 'We'd want the government to make sure there's some kind of a safety net for producers,' Mr Hosaka said at his farm in the northern prefecture of Niigata. 'It's easy enough to switch rice for feed or processed foods to staple rice. But tilling land for new paddies or switching from wheat or soybeans would require labour, machinery and all kinds of investments.' In 2025, Hosaka allocated all but 10ha of his 180-ha land for staple rice, reducing feed-use rice by 20ha given the attractive prices. But he worries that prices could plunge if Japan's overall production goes unchecked under the new policy, set to be implemented from the 2027 crop year. Top stories Swipe. Select. Stay informed. 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'It's important that rice prices settle at levels acceptable to both producers and consumers,' he said. Mr Hosaka hopes prices would stabilise around 3,000 to 3,500 yen - a level Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba also hopes would be palatable for voters. Supermarket prices fell for a fifth straight week, to 3,801 yen in the seven days to June 22, but were still 70 per cent higher than the same period in 2024. National crisis For Japanese people, rice is more than just a staple food. Cultivated in the country for more than 2,000 years, rice is considered sacred in the indigenous Shinto religion and is deeply ingrained in local tradition and culture. The Japanese are famously proud of their short-grain Japonica variety, protecting the market with trade barriers. So when rice turned into a luxury item this year, consumers fumed and policymakers - facing imminent elections - worried. With an eye on voters ahead of an upper house election on July 20, the government has been releasing emergency rice from its stockpile to sell for about 2,000 yen per 5kg. Farmers - also traditionally an important voting bloc for Mr Ishiba's Liberal Democratic Party - were told it was a dire but necessary move to protect Japan's food security and prevent consumers from switching permanently away from homegrown rice. But for most of the past 50 years, Japan has poured its energy into doing the opposite: providing subsidies to farmers to grow crops other than staple rice so as to prevent oversupply and a fall in prices. That system backfired last year when the farm ministry misread supply from the heat-damaged 2023 harvest, resulting in a severe shortage in August 2024. The ensuing surge in prices made Japan an anomaly against a fall in global prices, and exposed the risks of its approach. The new policy, if successful, would prevent a recurrence by allocating 350,000 tons of rice for export in 2030 - an eight-fold jump from 45,000 tons in 2024 - that could be redirected to the domestic market in the event of a shortage, the government says. Some agricultural experts say the policy is unrealistic. The idea of selling expensive Japanese rice abroad is counterintuitive, especially when even Japan is importing record amounts of the grain despite the 341 yen per kg levy that had previously priced foreign products out of the market. Japanese have also acquired a taste for US Calrose rice, while imports from Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam have also been popular with businesses and cost-conscious consumers. 'Expensive rice might sell to niche markets, but getting that up to 350,000 tons would require price competitiveness, and there's a long way for that,' said Professor Kazunuki Ohizumi, professor emeritus at Miyagi University and an expert on agricultural management. The government aims to provide some form of support but also expects farmers to make their own efforts to consolidate, and make use of artificial intelligence and other technologies to lower production costs. Meanwhile, farmer Hosaka said, prices of fertilisers, pesticides and fuel have shot up, sending production costs through the roof. 'It's tough,' he said. 'The government has released quite a bit of stockpiled rice, so I'm very worried about prices falling even further.' REUTERS
Korea Herald
27-05-2025
- Politics
- Korea Herald
Tokyo-born scholar Yuji Hosaka steps into Seoul politics
Hosaka leads the DP's accusations against the PPP over alleged pro-Japanese remarks Yuji Hosaka, a Tokyo-born political scientist and professor at Sejong University in Seoul, is making his foray into South Korean politics, appearing alongside Democratic Party of Korea leaders at presidential campaign events — marking him as the latest foreign-born figure to enter the country's political arena. Although Hosaka publicly endorsed Moon Jae-in during the 2017 presidential election, he had not actively participated in party campaign events until recently. His affiliation with the liberal South Korean party further expanded on May 17, when he was appointed chair of the party's newly launched Committee to Eliminate Pro-Japanese Historical Distortion. The 14-member committee operates as part of the Democratic Party's official campaign structure through the June 3 presidential election. On Monday, during a press briefing at the Democratic Party's headquarters in Seoul, Hosaka accused the conservative People Power Party of promoting pro-Japanese narratives. His remarks came in response to recent controversial comments by People Power Party presidential candidate Kim Moon-soo, who claimed that Koreans under Japanese colonial rule were legally Japanese nationals. Hosaka strongly refuted the claim, saying it had no basis in the 1910 annexation treaty, the Meiji Constitution, or Japan's nationality laws at the time. 'The Japanese Empire treated Koreans as a separate group,' he said, 'placing them under surveillance as potential dissidents — not as fellow citizens.' 'New Right forces, backed by Japan, are working to distort historical facts to fit the claims of Japan's far right,' Hosaka added. 'Unless we eliminate these pro-Japan forces, another Yoon Suk Yeol will rise. This is a battle between common sense and absurdity, between defending the Constitution and destroying it.' The so-called New Right is a conservative movement in South Korea that emerged in the early 2000s. It seeks to reframe key historical events, including Japan's colonization of Korea, often portraying it as a period of modernization rather than oppression. In its statement Monday, the committee accused the New Right of reviving colonial-era narratives and undermining Korea's legal and historical identity. It denounced the theory of 'colonial modernization,' condemned the group's denial of wartime forced labor and sexual slavery, and warned against attempts to delegitimize Korea's sovereignty over Dokdo. The statement labeled the New Right 'an anti-state force.' According to the Democratic Party of Korea, the committee was created in response to a growing number of public statements by conservative politicians that downplay or justify Japan's colonial rule over Korea. 'This committee was not created for academic discussion,' one party official said. 'It is a response to direct political messaging that attempts to normalize the historical views of Japan's far right.' Hosaka has openly stated his alignment with the progressive bloc in South Korea. In a recent speech, he said, 'We must change the government and build a nation where people can live and realize their dreams. I will do everything I can to support those aiming to make that possible.' Asked whether he feared political retaliation, such as being blacklisted by conservative groups, Hosaka acknowledged the risk but said he would not be deterred. 'That possibility definitely exists,' he said, 'but I'm a rationalist. My political orientation has always been with the opposition here in Korea.' Reflecting on the 2015 comfort women agreement between Korea and Japan under the administration of former President Park Geun-hye, Hosaka criticized the process as fundamentally flawed. 'Even if you're conservative, you should be rational and trustworthy,' he said. 'The government failed to persuade the people. I believe the agreement must be renegotiated, but before that, we need to investigate why it was made in the first place.' Born in 1956, Hosaka moved to South Korea in the 1980s for academic research and became a naturalized Korean citizen in 2003. Over the years, he has emerged as a prominent advocate against historical revisionism and a vocal defender of Korea's sovereignty over disputed issues such as the Dokdo islets — called Takeshima in Japan. Since 1998, Hosaka has dedicated his academic career to Dokdo-related research and currently serves as the director of Sejong University's Dokdo Research Institute. His work focuses on gathering historical, legal and cartographic evidence to support Korea's territorial claim to the islets.
