In recent times, many people in Japan have been struggling with rapidly rising consumer prices and inflation. Among the many affected stables is rice: a culturally significant food that forms the foundation of the Japanese diet. A year ago, rice was commonly sold for 2,500 yen, or $17.25, for an 11-pound bag. Today, that price has nearly doubled, creating new problems for households that rely on home-cooked meals to stay within their budgets. Since rice is included in many Japanese recipes, its rising cost has significantly hurt people in low-income jobs, large families with children, and senior citizens on fixed incomes.
Many people, including agricultural economist Kunio Nishikawa, believe that the price rise is due to an error by the Japanese government. Until 1995, the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) of Japan controlled the amount of rice that farmers could produce by working closely with agricultural cooperatives. In the 1950s, the party began to raise the price of rice under a stable food control system, causing a reduction in rice consumption and giving farmers an incentive to produce more. Unintentionally, this created a rice glut, an oversupply of rice in the market, which led to lower prices and economic challenges for rice farmers. To address the oversupply in 1970, the government implemented a policy to reduce rice acreage, aiming at stabilizing prices and maintaining farmer incomes, since the LDP heavily relied on farmers’votes. After 1995, the stable food control system was abolished, limiting the government’s purchases of rice to amounts necessary for emergency reserves. This was done to allow farmers to avoid another rice glut. However, according to Professor Nishikawa, the government wrongly estimated the demand for rice to be 6.8 million tonnes, while the actual demand was 7.05 million tonnes in 2023 and 2024. The miscalculation resulted in a rising demand for rice, which increased due to tourists who visited Japan and a rise in people eating out after COVID-19. While the demand was 7.05 million tonnes, only 6.61 million tonnes of rice were produced, resulting in less rice than desired. Additionally, high temperatures affected the quality of the rice, further resulting in a low production. While the high prices are good for many struggling farmers across Japan, unrest has increased among the public, fueling discontent among the country’s consumers.
On May 18, 2025, Japanese Agriculture Minister Taku Edo added fuel to the flames after an “inappropriate” statement during his local rally. During the rally, the Minister of Agriculture joked, “I’ve never brought rice. My supporters have given me so much rice that I have so much I could sell it.” Originally intended to draw laughs, Edo’s comment sparked public outrage. Even after he apologized and conceded that he had gone “too far” with his remarks, opposition parties seized the moment to criticize him, threatening a no-confidence motion against Edo. In the end, Eto resigned on May 21.
On the same day, Shinjiro Koizumi, an experienced LDP Cabinet member, took Eto’s role. Despite being young and high in the LDP ranks, Koizumi is known for enacting a ban on the practice of handing out free plastic bags by businesses when he was Minister of the Environment. Although this was done to mitigate plastic waste, citizens were unhappy, and plastic bag refusal rates grew to over 75%, a striking comparison to the 25% before the law was passed. Upon hearing that Koizumi had replaced Eto as the Minister of Agriculture, Japanese citizens stormed to X (originally Twitter), making sarcastic remarks that they would now have to pay for “rice bags.” Soon, “charge for rice bags,” or 米袋有料化, became a trending topic with thousands of posts in only three hours, from citizens who worried that they would have to pay for the bags that held their increasingly expensive rice.
Written by Claire Liu
