Japan’s furor over rising rice prices is a reminder that state security is built on food.

By John Wright

The recent tumultuous rice price situation in Japan has been a rollercoaster ride. Beginning with a poor harvest in 2023 and a minor rice shortage in the late summer of 2024, many began to think Japan’s rice policy may not be fulfilling the country’s needs. The government, anticipating future trouble, issued a new rule in January 2025, making it easier to release selective amounts of rice from national stockpiles in the event of emergencies. Then in the spring of 2025, the problem was made clearer by a sudden surge in rice prices, which rose by nearly 90 percent over 2024 levels. That catapulted rice prices to the front-and-center position of Japanese politics – just in time for this summer’s critical upper house election.

Missing from the price-focused conversation is the well-worn geopolitical fact that food security means state security. For decades, people living in the G-7 nations have enjoyed food security, a situation mostly appreciated as an absence of want. Classically, though, food security has meant storing and controlling enough food for one’s citizens and armies to eat. 

A comparison is instructive: Like Japan, Italy’s topography is largely hostile to agriculture: mountainous in the center, featuring sunbaked drylands and mosquito-infested marshes, interspersed unevenly by rich and fertile river valleys, though these are spectacularly fertile. Beginning around the end of the Roman Republic (approximately 9 A.D.), the Italian peninsula has ever since been unable to feed its population with only the arable land available in Italy. As such, Italians have been importing most of their food from abroad for centuries, and this fact has been a major security concern for all major powers on the peninsula since. Disruptions to deliveries of imported grain was a major factor in the later fall of the Roman Empire when the empire’s breadbasket, North Africa, was lost to barbarians. 

Contemporary Japan shares Italy’s concerns. Like Italy, Japan is unable to support the population of its home islands with its available land, and this has been the case for some time. Also like contemporary Italy, Japan’s ability to maintain its food security is largely a function of the post-war economic system led by the United States and victorious powers in World War II, and the global trading system it protects. Recently though, a combination of rapid economic and demographic changes have started to threaten Japan’s food security, which deserves to be re-examined.  

Inflation is one culprit. According to Bank of Japan records, March 2025 saw inflation in Japan at 3.6 percent, 1.6 percent over its desired 2 percent target. Inflation is a sign that too much money is chasing too few goods. Rising rice prices combined with this inflation can only mean not enough rice is on the market, a result of two main factors: long-standing Japanese domestic agricultural protectionist policies designed to support existing farmers at the expense of growing more crops and encouraging more people to farm, and resistance to imports caused by cultural preferences for Japanese-grown rice. This latter fact is heightened by the persistent “inside” versus “outside” concept, which rules how Japanese think of relations with others – and goods from elsewhere.

Political tone-deafness does not help. The domestic political conversation around the rice price issue has ranged from politicians claiming there is no need to import rice to outright refusing to cooperate with additional production efforts. A lack of seriousness led to Agriculture Minister Eto Taku’s May 2025 gaffe where he seemed to dismiss the issue of rice prices, which forced his resignation. 

The choice as Eto’s replacement – then-Minister of the Environment Koizumi Shinjiro – was a good one, and to his credit Koizumi immediately pledged to fix the problem, noting there were no “sacred cows” when it comes to agriculture. He had also told a press gaggle earlier in May that “Japan’s agriculture policy has been so beholden to the farm lobby that reforms to help the consumer have been put off. Rice is a typical example of such postponement.” He’s right. The farm lobby’s massive political power is the main obstacle between the Japanese populace and cheaper rice, and it shows. If Koizumi is allowed to work on the problem with free hands, there will likely be improvement. 

Since the price surges began, government policies have flirted perilously close to price fixing, with pledges to lower the price of rice below 4,000 yen per 5 kilograms as soon as possible. There are only two ways to lower the price of a good: increase supply, which lowers demand and thus the price, or fix the price through government decree. The latter is usually disastrous, only serving to create black markets and unfair access. If powerful political forces in the ruling government refuse to budge on imports, this is a real concern. Once again, Rome offers a historical lesson: in one of the earliest recorded price fixing laws, Emperor Diocletian issued his Edict on Maximum Prices in 301 AD in an attempt to curb inflation, predictably resulting in stockpiling, price gouging, and black marketeering. 

Another problem for Japan’s rice supply is one that has been in motion for a half-decade: urban growth in Tokyo and out of rural areas. According to the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications’ statistics dashboard website, the only prefecture that has seen consistent population growth over the last 15 years is the Tokyo Metropolis. The trend is clear: people are leaving rural areas and moving to Tokyo. Combined with a rock-bottom national birthrate and negative population growth across Japan, this raises serious concerns about the future of Japan’s agriculture sector.

Essentially, no one in Japan wants to be a farmer, but not because people hate farming life. Rather, it’s because of the same domestic policies that caused rice prices to surge in the first place. Becoming a farmer is less profitable than packing up the family and pursuing urban life in Tokyo. If farming were more profitable, more people would do it; that is simple economics. 

The consequences of a state’s staple food becoming suddenly expensive are very real. First, there is the obvious: it creates large amounts of stress and concern across the entire populace over something everyone needs to live. Second, it places additional pressure on the ruling political party to prioritize the issue, distracting them from other pressing efforts like security reform and diplomatic affairs. Third, it hobbles the economy because people must now spend more of their disposable income on goods that will be consumed rather than business investments, property, or other services, which serve to develop an economy. In a very real sense, when rice becomes more expensive the population must literally eat more of Japan’s economy. 

Fortunately for Japan, its eastern-looking trade lanes between itself and the United States are well-protected, and the U.S. could conceivably export enough rice to cover any gap Japan may have. The U.S. has already promised to do so, with Ambassador George Glass moving swiftly since his arrival in Japan last month. His opinion piece in the Mainichi Shimbun revealed his understanding of the situation, and the United States’ efforts helped conclude a rice purchase deal whereby the most famous U.S. rice variety, Calrose, will be sold via Japan’s commercial giant Aeon. 

To lower prices, Japan has no choice but to culturally hold its nose and import rice. Japan’s “minimum access” rice tariff system remains an obstacle to getting cheaper rice into the hands of its consumers, but this deal is a start.  

In the book “Rice As Self,” anthropologist Emiko Ohnuki-Tierney attempted to connect Japan’s preference for the world’s most popular grain to the Japanese sense of self-identity. While the book reflects the contemporary obsession with cross-cultural studies, when it comes to security Ohnuki-Tierney was on to something. Ignoring the staple food supply’s connection to culture and security is foolhardy, and the recent rice price issue is a stark reminder that without food security nothing else is truly safe.  

Ultimately, Japan will either find a way to reliably provide affordable rice to its citizens or it will suffer unacceptable consequences to its security. As the Romans understood and learned the hard way, food security ultimately becomes national security. 

Published Date: June 18, 2025