The Japanese, like other nations, have long placed food and farming at the heart of their traditional culture. They have long regarded rice, especially, with a semi-mystical reverence, performing a whole series of seasonal rituals to honour and propitiate local rice deities to ensure an abundant crop.
Over the last 70 years or so, farming hasn’t loomed large only in the Japanese psyche. Farmers have also played a disproportionately powerful role in Japanese politics. In an economy that has long been fiercely protective of many domestic industries, few have been quite so shielded from foreign competition as the local agricultural sector.
However, the power of Japan’s farming lobby is now waning, and the consequences of its decline promise to reshape international relations across Asia and beyond.
Read more at the South China Morning Post
