Japan veers from rice shortage to glut, dealing blow to farmers

Hiroshi Asano, 59, farms a relatively large 38 hectares of rice fields in Chiba Prefecture. | BLOOMBERG

Sep 29, 2026

Last year, Japan was flooding its rice market with emergency stockpiles in a bid to mollify voters angered by the soaring price of its staple grain.

Now, it has the opposite problem: a glut.

That’s welcome news for shoppers, but the whiplash is hurting people such as Hiroshi Asano, 59, who farms a relatively large 38 hectares of rice fields in Chiba, close to Tokyo. He expects to make a loss this year, and he’s worried smaller-scale farmers won’t be able to survive.

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