NEWSWORTHY
The city of Hakui in Ishikawa Prefecture is using organic rice, which is grown without pesticides or fertilizers, to compete in a growing global market. With crop prices expected to drop after the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership goes into effect at the ...
Japanese firm launches ready-to-eat 'emergency rice' in the Philippines
A Japanese ready-to-eat rice-maker held an event Tuesday in the Philippines to formally introduce the market to its Rice-to-Go product, intended mainly for use in emergency and disaster situations. Kiyosada Egawa, chairman of Biotech Japan Corp., said at the product unveiling event that he "would ...
Japanese rice farmers now see overseas market as potential savior
Rice farmers are seizing on their chance to boost sales for their high-quality product amid a fall in domestic demand and expected liberalization of trade rules. Kazuya Terasawa, 66, plans to export about 10 percent of this year's output from his paddies in Niigata. The ...
Amid falling consumption, Japan's aging rice farmers face an uncertain future
Once deemed so important it served as a form of currency, Japanese rice has fallen out of favor with younger, westernized consumers, a shift that has left aging farmers struggling for survival. Rice consumption has nearly halved over the past 50 years. As the older ...
Autumn is the season for shinmai, newly harvested rice
Shinmai — rice harvested and processed during the current calendar year — is celebrated for its fresh, clean taste and subtle sweetness. But komai (old rice) also has its place in Japanese history and the kitchen.
A popular rice ball shop stands near Tokyo Station's Yaesu Central Gate, drawing long lines of customers waiting to buy products made with rice from Aizu, Fukushima Prefecture, known for remaining soft with a touch of sweetness even when it gets cold. As it takes ...
Japan Times 1943: Respect for parents plays vital role in Japanese life
100 YEARS AGO Tuesday, Aug. 13 1918 Hunger riots becoming grave national matter The food riots that began more than a week ago when 200 women of Mizubashi, a fishing village in Toyama Prefecture, met on the seashore to discuss their greivances, have assumed alarming proportions and ...
Niigata firm Biotech Japan strives to introduce precooked rice to the Philippines
A local subsidiary of a Japanese company is introducing precooked, ready-to-eat rice products to the Philippine market using its parent firm's unique technology. BiotechJP Corp., based in Batangas province immediately south of the capital, Manila, last year launched Echigo, a precooked, protein-reduced rice intended mainly ...
Nippon Express falsified inspection data on government-stockpiled rice
Nippon Express Co. said one of its employees falsified inspection stamps on government-stockpiled rice it had stored, in another case involving quality-control misconduct by a major Japanese firm.
Kumamoto company turns to brown rice paste in bid to revive Japan's abandoned farmland
Alarmed by an increase in abandoned rice paddies amid the Westernization of the Japanese diet and a graying population, a Kyushu dealer of major agricultural machinery-maker Kubota Corp. began producing rice flour in 2010 as an ingredient for bread and pasta to make up ...
How early 20th-century Japanese rice breeders shaped the future of the staple food in Taiwan
Rice has been grown in Taiwan for centuries, but many modern varieties of the island's staple food have their origins in Japan. While the earliest written record of rice being cultivated on the subtropical island dates back to 1602, archaeologists have found evidence that aboriginal ...
Government to support growing exports of precooked rice with project to upgrade packaging
The agriculture ministry is set to introduce a subsidy program aimed at helping improve plastic containers for cooked white rice, in an effort to increase exports of the product, sources have said. Many such prepackaged steamed rice products, consumed after being warmed in a microwave ...
