Japan grows enough food for only 1 in 3 of its people, reminder to appreciate food

I came across this show covering on Japan's food self-sufficiency crisis. Singaporeans love to visit Japan and rave about their food and how things are really fresh and they make many of their food with love and dedication. It is sad watching and learning that they used to had 73% of self sufficiency in terms of food but it dropped to 38% in recent years as more farmers choose to retire or had no choice due to ageing and with no successors. 

I was kind of shocked seeing this as I always had the impression that most of their produce are made in Japan however staples for them like Natto has it's main ingredient soya bean imported and also because of the past where imports were popular, some of the products were not farmed domestically and importing them was easier. But with the weakening yen, recent times have made them expensive to the locals.  

They mentioned that they have a self-sufficiency for meat at 65% however due to the feed being imported almost entirely, it brings the self-sufficiency to 17%. That is crazy if you think about it as the raw materials, the building blocks of the whole ecosystem for food is imported. Japan used to be able to farm quite sufficiently but various factors caused them to reduce. 

Rice is something that are local farmed but rice farming is something very much dependent on the weather and with changes in the climate, costs have gone up significantly. Farming rice has also become not profitable hence farmers have been switching and with that, grows a deficiency. 

I am sure that we have seen their beautiful fruits like melon, grapes and strawberries costing a bomb, with that some superficial grade where the ugly produce are sold cheaper and this brings about quality over quantity. This results in them throwing away the ugly food, causing much wastage. 

Warmer seas have also made seafood change with fishes getting smaller and reduced quantity. Really interesting to find out on all these and so the next time when I dig into a don or bento, I will be remembering the hard work of the farmers and how precious food is. We all need a reminder like that.