Recently, the price of rice in Japan has skyrocketed, causing public complaints.

According to reports, rice prices in Japan increased by 70.7% year-on-year in January 2025. The price of a 10kg bag of rice has increased to 8,000 yen, plus consumption tax, it costs 8,500 yen (approximately US$56.41).

The price of 5 kg of rice has also increased to 4,185 yen, which is approximately US$27.78.

Seeing that public dissatisfaction boiled over, in order to "stabilize" rice prices, Japan invented an ingenious new method, introducing small-sized packaging capacity, adding a 4kg size (previously, rice packaging was generally 10kg or 5kg), and then keeping the price consistent with 5kg, giving people the illusion that rice prices have returned to stability.

You know what? You might not be able to tell if you're not careful!

Good news: Japanese rice prices return to 3,000 yen per bag

Bad news: Weight is down!

What’s even more outrageous is yet to come.

Japan's food self-sufficiency rate has remained low for many years, reaching about 38% in caloric terms from 2016 to 2023. At the same time, Japan has also experienced other food supply problems such as "egg shortage".

Against this background, Japan recently promulgated a new bill, the "Act on Countermeasures for Food Supply Difficulty Situations", which is aimed at responding to possible food supply crises.

The more radical statement of this bill is that starting from April 1st, 2025, all Japan will implement a food rationing system similar to a wartime state.

According to Japan’s Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, Japan’s food security is at risk due to a variety of factors:

For example, climate change has led to crop failure, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine has caused supply chain instability, the increase in global population has led to fierce competition in food procurement, and the surge in tourists to Japan has led to increased demand for rice, etc.

It's really strange. They just can't see their own problems!

After carefully checking the information, I found that there is a deeper reason for the skyrocketing price of rice in Japan.

Last year, the Norinchukin Bank suffered a major setback in its investment in U.S. bonds. It had a deficit of as much as 1.5 trillion yen, which is equivalent to 9.96 billion US dollars. This hole is simply impossible to fill.

In addition, the the Japan Agricultural Cooperatives (JA Group) has demanded a year-by-year reduction in the planting area of staple grains, the abolition of double or triple cropping in a year and a change to a single harvest per year, and has prohibited the improvement of crop varieties. It is going further and further down the path of self-destruction.

Moreover, the JA Group has asked the government to impose a tariff of up to 280% on imported rice, making it difficult for foreign rice to enter, and the tight domestic rice supply in Japan cannot be alleviated by imports.

The JA Group's statement is that in order to ensure self-sufficiency in food, imports are prohibited, and in order to ensure farmers' profits, farmers are asked to reduce production. Isn't this too absurd? !

This is the first time that in peacetime, without the influence of any external factors, a country has simply ruined its own food supply and needs to be rationed!

What does this mean? Did you burn yourself to death before the fire even started?

In short, the people of Japan, hang on, the "good days" are still to come!