It was back in the autumn of 2011. Wind blowing from the Pacific Ocean was cutting through the golden rice fields.

Takashi Asano, 67, who had evacuated from the town of Okuma in Fukushima Prefecture following the March 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and subsequent Fukushima nuclear disaster, had returned temporarily to his home.

When Asano was gazing at the paddy fields behind his former home from afar, it looked like the field was full of rice ready to be harvested.