Japan Press Weekly

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2024 November 13 - 19 [POLITICS]

Increased opposition seats have great potential to improve Japan’s agricultural policy

Japanese Communist Party member of the House of Representatives Tamura Takaaki on November 13 took part in an event hosted by the Japan Family Farmers Movement (Nouminren) in Kunisaki City, Oita Prefecture.

Tamura, in his address to family farmers in the Kyushu and Okinawa region, said, “The LDP-Komei coalition alone can no longer pass budgets on their own as a result of the general election,” adding “Let’s work together to help change the present agricultural policy that is import-dependent and at the mercy of the United States!”

Nouminren Vice Chair Sasawatari Yoshio said, “Now that opposition parties increased their seats in the Lower House, it has become possible to improve Japan’s food self-sufficiency rate and to expand support for producers and new farmers.”

Sasawatari noted that the war in Ukraine and the recent shortage of rice have prompted more and more people to take the food issue as their own personal concern. He said, “Whether we can improve the nation’s food self-sufficiency rate and have the government radically expand its support for farmers depends on our movement from now on.”

In the meantime, a subcommittee on agriculture established under the government Fiscal System Council argues that there is no need to expand domestic production of food items that are currently covered by imports and that it is not appropriate to put undue emphasis on the food self-sufficiency rate.