Self Doubts Among Japanese About Rice Price-Protecting Measures

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Hiroko Tabuchi, Japanese Begin to Question Protections Given to Homegrown Rice. New York Times, Jan 10, 2014.
www.nytimes.com/2014/01/10/busin ... s-sacred-place.html

Quote:

"Unlike rice, Japan-grown vegetables face global competition, with most import levies between 0 percent and 3 percent. Still, four-fifths of the vegetables the Japanese consume are homegrown. Vegetable growers on average earn far more than rice farmers.

"They [Japan's farm policies and high tariff] instead protect a sprawling network of farm co-ops that has leeched off farmers and stymied their efforts to innovate, he [Shigeaki Okamoto, a successful ruit and vegetable farmer] says. That network, as Mr. Okamoto likes to say, is bureaucracy run amok. About 216,000 people work in agricultural cooperatives in Japan, under the umbrella of the Japan Agricultural Group, or J.A. There is one co-op employee for every two full-time rice farmers.

Note:
(a) Aga, Niigata 新潟県東蒲原郡 阿賀(町)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aga,_Niigata

(b) "Mr [Hiromitsu] KONSHŌ points to his Echigo Farm, a rare upstart in rural Japan"
農業生産法人 越後ファーム株式会社  代表取締役社長  近正 宏光
(i) ファーム (pronounced "f [long vowel of"a"]-mu") is katakana.
(ii) Echigo 越後 【えちご】 (n): "Echigo; old name for Niigata Prefecture"
(iii) Echigo Province  越後国
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Echigo_Province
(map)
(iv) Both 'kon" and "shō" are Chinese pronunciations of the respective kanji characters.

(c) "Akira AMARI, Japan’s trade minister"
甘利 明

amai あまい 《甘い》 (adj) "sweet"