In Hungry World, Japan's Farmers Are Stuck With High-Priced Rice

Hiroto Endo and son Ryoshi are preparing to plant, though a quarter of last fall's crop sits unsold, in part because of Japan's changing diet. (By Blaine Harden -- The Washington Post)
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It is the soaring cost of wheat -- which has roughly doubled in the past year -- that is creating headlines in Japan these days and causing consumers to howl.

To quiet the howling -- and to chip away at the chronic problem of finding uses for Japan's rice surplus -- the Ministry of Agriculture is considering using rice as a stand-in for wheat in making flour. Proposals call for substituting up to 20 percent of wheat imports with domestic rice.

But the plan has a serious drawback, said Edamoto, of the ministry's rice planning division. As much as the global price of wheat has increased, Edamoto said, flour made from Japanese rice is still too pricey to be a cost-efficient substitute.

Out here on the Endo farm, the government's rice-flour scheme offers little hope. Endo grows a premium organic rice that sells for as much as double the normal Japanese price. It is not remotely suitable for making flour.

In Internet postings, rice aficionados rave about the quality and taste of Endo's rice, and the government says niche markets for organically grown rice are showing signs of growth.

But a large slice of last year's rice crop still sits in Endo's warehouse, waiting for buyers.

"It is going to be a very tough year for us," he said.