With the Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics Games less than four years away, Japanese farmers are being urged to make every effort to win a certificate under Global Good Agricultural Practices, an internationally influential farm certification scheme for sustainable production process management covering product safety, environmental impact and the health, safety and welfare of workers and animals. The government for its part needs to help farmers clear the Global GAP criteria and receive the certificates as quickly as possible. Otherwise there is a chance that food made from domestic farm products will not be served in the Olympic and media villages during the Tokyo Games.

The standards for foodstuffs to be used at the 2020 Games will be adopted in March. It is expected that priority will be given to foodstuffs that have cleared the Global GAP standards. For the 2012 London Olympics, only foodstuffs that had obtained certification under such programs as the Global GAP and Marine Stewardship Council were allowed in meals served to participants. The Rio de Janeiro Games last year set similar standards.

Retailers in Europe worked out a common farm certification scheme called EurepGAP in 1997, which evolved into Global GAP in 2007. Some 160,000 farmers and farming groups in 124 countries have acquired the certificates. It is thought that 70 to 80 percent of foodstuffs marketed in Europe have the certification. However, as of the end of June last year, only 399 farmers and farming groups in Japan held the Global GAP certificates. It will be impossible for them to supply the millions of meals that will be served to participants, which include athletes, coaches and other officials, during the entire period of the Olympics and Paralympics. In the worst case, the ingredients for most of the meals would have to be brought in from abroad.