Japan's rice inventory reduction leads to people's rush to stock up on grain

Japan's "rice turmoil": Brown rice inventory hits a record low and there is a shortage of rice.

On August 20, according to Japan's Yahoo News Network, the Japanese Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries released a report showing that at the end of June this year, Japan's brown rice inventory reached the lowest level on record. The average transaction price rose by 14% year-on-year, the highest value in nearly 11 years. Correspondingly, there is a shortage of rice in many markets in Japan, causing public concern. Japanese media even put forward the statement of "Reiwa's rice turmoil".

Yomiuri TV's visit found that many supermarkets in Tokyo have imposed purchase restrictions on household bags of rice weighing more than 5 kilograms and instead offer 2-kilogram packages or more expensive varieties of American-produced rice. The person in charge of a supermarket in Saitama Prefecture said that the description of "rice turmoil" is not an exaggeration. Many customers reported that they have replaced rice with somen noodles and rice cakes as their staple food.

Japanese media generally believe that the "rice turmoil" is caused by the poor rice harvest due to last year's sweltering heat and the surge in the number of tourists visiting Japan, expanding consumer demand. Yomiuri TV reported that Kishiro Yukiyuki, a professor at Keio University and a former Japanese government economic official, ***yzed that policy mistakes by the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries also caused a reduction in rice production. Kishiro Yukiyuki said: "The Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries informed farmers that the demand for rice is decreasing and there is no need to grow edible rice anymore. Instead, they encourage the production of animal feed. Farmers who respond to the policy can receive subsidies. In this way, the supply of rice will naturally decrease."

Akiba Hiroyuki, president of Aki Co., Ltd., which operates chain supermarkets and restaurants, told Yomiuri TV that as new rice enters the market one after another, people don't need to overstock grain due to panic. Akiba Hiroyuki focused on agricultural environmental issues through "rice turmoil": "Now the price of rice is very low, farming is difficult to make a profit, the number of elderly people is constantly decreasing, the number of abandoned farmland is increasing day by day, and there are no young people to take over. So just because of the hot weather, the price of rice has risen sharply. We must control this aspect."