Visiting An Organic Farm In Japan With Food, Inc. Director Robert Kenner
Japan Citizens' Network for Sustainable Food and Agriculture (J)
Consumers Union of Japan (E)
There is no such thing as "nationalism" when it comes to crops or species that have evolved over millions of years.
I liked how Robert Kenner was able to transcend a lot of the issues and cut to the chase.
Soy - so important here in Japan for a lot of stuff you take for granted in the food we eat every day in Japan, like soy sauce, miso, and natto, as well as eda-mame, dried beans. No artificial additives necessary! For hundreds of years. Growing a lot of grains and vegetables is the key to solving the global food problem, not the GMO doctrine imposed by a few multinational corporations. What we need is more diversity, not less.
Rice - of course even more a matter of political debate, as the "free" trade promoting people think agriculture should be abandoned, so that industry and manufacturing can prevail. In Japan, there is a balance, but that is not appreciate by other trade partners. Or is it? With the TPP I sense a change in approach. TPP negotiators in 2012 need to come back to earth, and visit places like Uozumi-san's farm.
How about it?
This is a great commentary from The Mainichi, Takao Yamada:
Fighting TPP with 'reverence' for farming and 'expulsion' of consumer culture
Under a cloudy sky, Akira Sudo is seen amidst his rice paddies in Tome, Miyagi Prefecture, on Aug. 3. (Mainichi)
I can't seem to make sense of the ongoing debate
on Japan's possible participation in the Trans-Pacific Partnership free
trade zone (TPP). I think it's the pro-TPP attitude of "let's open Japan
up to the world" that rubs me the wrong way. I never noticed us being
under a policy of "sakoku" -- or isolation -- like the one that had been
implemented by the Tokugawa shogunate for some 200 years until U.S.
Commodore Matthew Perry arrived with his black ships in 1853. It has
been unnatural the way the TPP issue has been framed for the public and
the way the debates have been carried out, all in an effort to convince
the public of the righteousness of TPP participation.
That the Japanese government feels that it has to
go along with the U.S. pursuit of open markets because it is indebted
to the U.S. for national security reasons is understandable. However,
neither the Noda administration nor the media have any fundamental ideas
on how to strike the right balance between liberalization and
regulation, and on the direction in which the country should be taken.
At the root is a sense that we are merely drifting about.
Farmer and poet Kanji Hoshi, 76, who has been
engaged in organic farming for 38 years in the Yamagata Prefecture town
of Takahata, is adamantly opposed to Japan's TPP participation. While it
is standard for the media to showcase arguments for and against TPP,
here, I'll only talk about Hoshi because there's no sense of drifting in
his argument.
Hoshi started farming in 1954, at the age of 19.
Not long afterward came the 1961 enactment of the Agricultural Basic
Law, whose objective was to increase productivity and income.
Agriculture grew more and more mechanized, and along with the heavy use
of pesticides, chemical fertilizers and herbicides, led to greater
harvests. At the same time, however, food safety began to crumble and
the problem of environmental pollution grew serious.
In 1973, the Organic Agriculture Association was
established in Takahata, with Hoshi at its helm. In "Fukugo osen"
(Complex contamination), a true-to-life novel that was serialized in a
newspaper between 1974 and 1975 and caused a great sensation, author
Sawako Ariyoshi included an anecdote about biting into one of Hoshi's
chemical-free apples.
It goes without saying that organic,
chemical-free farming is hard. Hoshi was ridiculed for "trying to go
back to the Edo period," but he continued to explore new methods and
repeatedly made mistakes. It was through his activism against the
spraying of pesticides from helicopters that he found like-minded
comrades. Eventually, in an act of revenge, Hoshi harvested sparking,
tortoiseshell-like brown rice, for which he was awarded the gold medal
in a nationwide contest.
Through long-term efforts, loaches, fireflies,
river snails and meadowhawk dragonflies returned to the land. Organic
agriculture was now well established in Takahata. Hoshi is part of a
network comprising over 100 consumer groups and rice sellers, and has
had opportunities to exchange ideas with university instructors and
students pursuing environment, life and agriculture.
Hoshi is the author of an essay called "Sonno joi
no shiso: han TPP no chiiki ron" (The philosophy of revere agriculture,
expel the barbarians: anti-TPP localism), published in May 2011 in the
book, "Takahata-gaku" (Takahataology). In it, he writes: "I would like
the philosophy of revering agriculture and expelling the barbarians to
be the stronghold against the black ships of TPP," Hoshi writes. "We
need to give primary importance to agriculture for its production of
food for life, and to justly appreciate its function of protecting the
environment. If we destroy our beautiful homeland, we will not be able
to face our descendents. 'Expel the barbarians' refers to the
elimination of our disposable consumer civilization. We need to possess a
set of values necessary to live simply and spiritually rich in a mature
society, and let us attempt self realization."
In this essay, Hoshi categorically states that
TPP participation will devastate Japanese agriculture. Our dinner tables
will be filled with imported products whose manufacturers and
processors we don't know, sacrificing food safety, and rural landscapes
will be destroyed, Hoshi says, and warns that local communities
themselves will collapse.
Pro-TPP advocates say that domestic agriculture
must be revived in a way that it will be able to withstand market
liberalization. And by "revival," what they mean is boost "profitable
agriculture" aimed for since the Agricultural Basic Law was implemented
to a "more profitable agriculture." They argue that agriculture must
also contribute to economic growth. Hoshi, however, sees the value in
agriculture that protects something that is different from economic
growth.
Both domestically and internationally, financial,
economic and social shockwaves are expected to become increasingly
intense and contradictions are bound to balloon. We may well reach a
time when no amount of money can buy us food. Does the light of the 21st
century side with economic growth and money-making? Or does it side
with Hoshi's hands-on practice and knowledge? This is the question that
needs to be asked. (By Takao Yamada, Expert Senior Writer)
Comments