Structural problems of Japans agriculture

This is for you, Yuki. NZZ writes about your hometown, Kochi, Japan. Kochi having 330’000 citizens is famous for its market on Sundays. There are a lot of elder Japanese shopping there and the ambiance is described as very peaceful. And there are a lot of elder vendors too who sell their own agricultural products. As in Switzerland, Japan seems to have problems finding enough young men and women wanting to work as farmers. A lot of the farmers are over 50 years old and the young farmers are having difficulties finding wives. This also adds to the problem and there is a great fear, that a lot of farms will have to close down. Some rural communities have organized trips to the Philipines to find suitable wives for the young farmers.

Only about 20 percent of farmers work fulltime on their farms. The majority has an extra job besides the farm. That the Japanese eat less rice, from 9.6 Mio. tons to 8.4 Mio. tons as bread and pasta are gaining market shares.

As the farmers usually vote for LDP, the government supports the farmers with special payment event though agriculture only produces 1.6 % of the GDP.