In recent years there has been much debate in Japan over rice, which is considered the "staple food" of the Japanese people. Certain agricultural policies and traditional attitudes, the aging of farming communities and the lack of successors have become major problems, leading to the overproduction of rice and falling prices. Agricultural policy has been forced to respond to these problems. This book summarizes the changing relationship between the Japanese people and rice over the past half century, pointing out four turning points. The book then discusses in detail the "rice paddy glut" as the most recent rice problem in Japan. The book also points out that a "fifth tipping point " will come in the near future, when there will be an excess of farmland, and suggests ways to deal with this problem. Similar problems could be on the horizon in the future for developing countries that have invested heavily in increasing rice production.
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Academics and graduate students of agricultural economic development, crop production, rice farming methods and national and international commodity markets.
Chapter 1: Separating the Rice Issue and the Rice Paddy Issue for Better
Understanding
Chapter 2: Self-Sufficiency in Rice Attained: The First Turning
Point in 1967
Chapter 3: From Rice Surplus to Paddy Surplus: The Second
Turning Point in 1978
Chapter 4: Internationalization of the Rice Problem:The
Third Turning Point in 1993
Chapter 5: Emergence of Concept of Full
Utilization of Rice Paddies: The Fourth Turning Point in 2008
Chapter 6: At
the Bottom of Todays Rice Problem
Chapter 7: Arrival of an Age of Farmland
Surplus: The Fifth Turning Point in 2025
Masayuki Ogawa is assistant professor in the Department of Agricultural Economics, Utsunomiya University, Japan and in the Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology. He is a visiting scholar at the Nippon Agricultural Research Institute, and a researcher at the Agricultural Policy Research Committee, Inc (NOHSEI CHOHSA IINKAI), Japan.
