Japanese agriculture is complicated by the paucity of land available for it. Rice and other crops in Japan are not only grown on farms, but also in towns and even cities. It seems that every bit of available space in Japan is used for growing food. The Japanese have only 13.5 million acres available for farming. The pre-war figure was over 15 million acres, but roads, train tracks, and new housing have encroached upon the farm lands. In contrast, the American farmers use only a third of their acreage, planting only 300 million acres and using another 500 million acres for grazing land. From these acreage figures, the really small size of Japan becomes immediately apparent. And Japan must manage to house and feed a population half the size of the American one on about one-twentieth of the land area the Americans enjoy. How they manage to do so seems to be the real “miracle” of Japan.
Thus, the Japanese farmer works quite hard. On the average he expends seven hundred man-hours per acre of rice. In addition to his labor, the Japanese farmer applies chemical fertilizers at a rate sixteen times the American average, and produces about 4,220 pounds of rice per acre, one of the highest yields in the world. In all, the Japanese farmer manages to produce 80 percent of the nation’s food requirements. In the past, Japan depended on importations of foreign rice to meet its needs. But due to improved agricultural methods and the incentive of generous governmental subsidies, the farmers managed to produce a record 14.4 million tons of rice in 1967 and stayed over the 14 million ton mark for four consecutive years. Since the Japanese consume only 12 million tons of rice per year — some 214 pounds each compared to the American average of only 10 pounds — the Japanese Government was faced with a prodigious surplus, which in 1970 amounted to over 7.2 million tons. Since space to store rice is as scarce in Japan as any other space, the government took steps to discourage further surplus production and decreased the 7.5 million acres of rice paddies. The 1971 crop was under 11 million tons, and it is expected that by 1977 rice production will have been curtailed by 20 percent.
In 1972 Japan’s gross agricultural production totalled a record five trillion yen, up 10 percent from the previous year, and agricultural income rose almost 17 percent.
Japanese agriculture is organized under the Nokyo, the “Agricultural Cooperative Movement,” which grew out of the pre-war producer co-operatives begun under the guidance of the government. The organization now consists of 11,930 individual co-operatives at the lowest level, 327 prefectural federations, and 26 different national federations. Including associate memberships, the organization embraces seven million households. With 370,000 workers the organization is among the nation’s largest employers. The co-operative covers every area of farm production and farm life. It offers advice and instruction in farm management and agricultural science. It provides supplies and daily necessities, buys and sells agricultural products, and also provides a wide range of financial services including savings, loans, and insurance. Recently, many co-operatives have established additional services: barber and beauty shops, gas stations, hospitals, marriage centers, nursery schools, and super-markets. Some national federations are now operating hotels and travel agencies, and are in the business of constructing housing estates. But most importantly, the Nokyo, through the pressure brought upon the government by its “rice senators,” has enabled the farmers to enjoy substantial government subsidies for their rice crops. However, these high subsidies price Japanese rice out of the world market.
Despite rice surpluses and a low public price for rice, Japan needs to import considerable quantities of food at relatively high prices. Thus, there is a plentiful supply of varied foods in Japan, but where the American consumer pays approximately 16 percent of his income for food, the Japanese consumer must pay about 35 percent of his. Presently, Japan imports over $1.2 billion worth of food from the United States alone. The Japanese Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry expects that by 1977 Japan will have to import 22 percent more wheat, 67 percent more feed grains, and 86 percent more soybeans than it does now.
The average Japanese now eats about ten times more meat than did the previous generation. Nearly 90 percent of the beef consumed is produced in Japan from a herd which numbers about 1.8 million cattle. Although meat is a relatively expensive food for most families, demand still exceeds supply, and the Japanese import more than 33,000 tons of foreign beef a year. Since foreign meat seems too roughly textured and full of fat to the average Japanese taste, some of the larger trading companies have started the operation of large ranches in Australia to produce beef specifically designed for the Japanese market.
In forestry as in agriculture there is an exodus of workers to the better paying, full-time jobs in industry and construction. Lumbering is seasonal and the average $6 a day pay is only on a day-to-day basis. Thus, although forests cover 70 percent of Japan, some 62.4 million acres, the country has to import 55 percent of its lumber needs, a figure which rises every year. In fact, large purchases of lumber by the Japanese from the west coast of the United States and Canada have caused shortages and high prices in those countries.
There is also an exodus of both young and older workers from Japanese fisheries. In fiscal 1969, about 572,000 fishermen working from 370,000 boats of all sizes managed to catch 8.6 million metric tons of fish. These fishermen not only supplied the Japanese average consumption of 127 pounds of sea food, but also exported $282 million worth of fish and fish products. However, fishing is on the decline because it is difficult and dangerous. But more importantly, fishing is on the decline due to the industrial pollution of the Japanese coastal waters and to the depletion of the more distant fishing grounds.
As important as the primary sectors of the Japanese economy might be to the nation, they furnish but a small fraction of the Gross National Product and are areas of the lowest incomes. Since the value of Japanese manufacturing is ten times the value of agricultural production, it would be cheaper in the long run for the nation to buy as much food as it can by the sale of manufactured goods than to grow its own food. The plans of the Japanese Government for the future call for a change in agricultural endeavors. The hope is to consolidate agriculture into farming households of about fifty acres each. Such a consolidation would allow of large scale use of machinery, increase production, raise farm incomes, and release workers for industry.
Seemingly oblivious to the roaring traffic of Kyoto, a peasant woman delivering vegetables calmly waits for the traffic lights.
Rice is grown everywhere in Japan, on every available patch of ground. Since commercial fertilizers are used exclusively, the countryside has lost that certain pungency of former days.
Rice is indispensable to the Japanese, but it was only after World War II that it became available to everyone as a daily staple. Improved agricultural methods and new types of rice account for the increased production. Till then, most farmers who grew rice were in no position to afford it as a daily food.
They usually ate barley and millet, and had rice only on special occasions as a great delicacy. Now rice is produced in abundance, and having rice three times a day is a reality. But western dietary habits are being adopted and rice consumption is decreasing rapidly among everyone.
INDUSTRY
Modern Japan has a full blown industrial system with fully two-thirds of its manufacturing output in heavy industry and chemicals. The production value of the Japanese chemical industry, for example, is over $14 billion. Fifteen Japanese companies have reached yearly sales of $1 billion, and Japanese industry produces every imaginable product under the sun and in profusion. Japan is first in the world in the production of cameras, electron microscopes, motorcycles, pianos, sewing machines, and ships. Japan produces almost half of the world’s entertainment electronics and about