Climate change, fewer farmers jeopardize Japan food security: report

Promote indoor vertical farming of all fruits and vegetables that lend themselves to this form of agriculture. Most row crops can be grown this way. Land freed by growing crops indoors may be devoted to crops that can only be grown outdoors. Indoor farms can be located within the cities the where the food will be consumed.

How exactly does climate change jeopardize Japan food security? There is a global greening, more plant life globally, more photosynthesis; more food.

Japanese government regulations jeopardize Japan food security. As productivity of farmers in Japan is low and regulations prevent young farmers from becoming more productive.

There is certainly a very strong case for more technology innovations in Japan, starting with following the science and approving plants with novel traits.

Oh, so it's the farmers who are "jeopardizing" food security then.

Not the filthy rich mega corporations who want to control our food supply.

Supply and demand, that will make food price will increase, with current Japanese weak yen. That won't help anything.

Desert TortoiseToday  07:56 am JST

Promote indoor vertical farming of all fruits and vegetables that lend themselves to this form of agriculture. Most row crops can be grown this way. Land freed by growing crops indoors may be devoted to crops that can only be grown outdoors. Indoor farms can be located within the cities the where the food will be consumed.

I have to respectfully disagree. This is such a niche thing that only the top hotels might buy the food. The planet already has everything...called the earth,the soil, the rain, the sun. it might be better to build apartments, instead of buying a plot of land and cutting it up into ten houses with NO gardens.(to max profits) Shops that took up space when they could build up higher freeing up Land space and building accommodation for a community. They just sold a huge plot of land and then plonked 10 houses on it, and not one has a garden, and they have stopped growing food now. Building more concrete buildings to grow food might sound great on TV, in a news article, but I think the real farmers know real farming. Then there is the cost of building the building,( past on to the consumer) then there are the running costs, heating, lighting, water, cleaning, and then there is building upkeep, and finally the decommissioning. Farmers don't just grow food, they provide an environment for insects, animals, rivers, forests, woods, and butterflies a balance I don't think humans can emulate. I'll let nature's jungle work, and let the concrete jungle stay out of it.

> proxyToday  08:35 am JST

How exactly does climate change jeopardize Japan food security? There is a global greening, more plant life globally, more photosynthesis; more food.

Although global greening enhances plant growth, it cannot fully mitigate the adverse effects of climate change on food production and resilience.

Climate change jeopardizes Japan's food security by causing heat stress on crops, increasing extreme weather events, and proliferating pests and diseases. Rising sea temperatures and ocean acidification disrupt fisheries, while sea level rise and soil degradation affect agricultural productivity. These impacts lead to higher food prices and supply chain disruptions, exacerbating economic and social vulnerabilities.

"Climate change" is the boogeyman excuse for many things that are the result of urbanization. Fake science.

Wtf climate change cited as main reason but article didn't say why? Maybe I just missed it

@Dr Maybe

Crop yields continue to increase around the world. And here is a link for you: https://farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2023/12/world-and-regional-trend-crop-yields-in-an-era-of-climate-change.html

Projections are now slanting towards global population to peak before 2050 so Japan and the world are not going to run out of food.

Offer those facing a prison sentence the chance to do their time as an agricultural labourer. Better than sharing a cell with a violent and occasionally horny gangster.

We will need to produce more food under cover in future and switch to different crops. Crops that are resource and labour intensive will be the first to go. Rice being one of the most vulnerable.

@GBR48

Who is we? The C4 rice project will develop genetically modified rice varieties that photosynthesize using a different metabolic process than current C3 varieties, except in Japan of course, which will hold back productivity and continue to ban these innovations.

Climate change deniers, they’re like the new 9-11-was-an-inside-job crowd.

Abe234, Japan and many other nations do not have enough arable land to grow all of the food their people need. Add in a warming climate and rising seas eating into available land and the situation for many nations becomes even worse. Water is scarce in much of the world and becoming scarcer. Aquifers worldwide are being depleted. In my own home, California, farming is going to have to change drastically if the state is going to achieve the goals of a 2014 law to stabilize aquifers. Much land will have to be taken out of agriculture and soon. It is a painful process but necessary. If you look at parts of the San Joaquin Valley, subsidence from high volume ground water use has caused the ground to sink as much as ten meters in some locales. Major irrigation canals have to be rebuilt because subsidence has created huge sags in the canals that have reduced their capacity by as much as 60%. Farmers who paid good money in decades past to build those canals can no longer receive their full allocation of water from them due to over pumping of the aquifers along the canal route. As a result those farmers drill wells and further deplete their own aquifer. It has become a vicious circle the state is struggling to stop. Wells in many small towns have run dry as wealthy farmers drill even deeper wells and draw aquifers down further.

Indoor vertical farming has the advantage of producing over 70 times the crop yield per hectare of land compared to conventional farming. Done right, indoor vertical farms recycle nearly 100% of the water in the system reducing the strain on aquifers and surface water supplies, and because it is a clean room environment no pesticides or herbicides are used. Such farms can be built right in the cities where the food will be consumed, saving on transportation costs and associated pollution. Food can be grown all year instead of being seasonal. It is a way to grow many if not all row crops and thus free up land now used for these crops to grow other crops. The net effect is to expand your output of fresh fruits and vegetables, something places that are land constrained will need to do in the future while conserving both land and waters supplies as these become scarcer.

Desert Tortoise

Maybe you’re right. I think the land we use, can be used better. Growing food in cities is no problem. They used to be called allotments. Where local people grew their own food, mostly as a hobby, but now the land is sold off and converted to concrete. Homes, roads, parking, shopping areas. Cities are part of the reason water is depleted. Cities funnel water away from arable land and replenished the water table and dump it into rivers and the sea. However, I’m open to the idea but we’ve been over sold, over promised before, because everyone points to their interpretation of saving costs or how it’s better. Chemicals (not always bad, not always good), polution. I’ve seen these reasons used when we had horse problems and we industrialized. Too many horses, horse manure everywhere, the smell. So we converted to gasoline. Horse problem solved, now we could plant more, cheaper to produce and seemed environmentally better. Let’s say we switch to indoor farms. How much would we need to feed say Japans 50 million.(cause we still want some farmers to farm and not become a corporate slave, which I think would happen). How much concrete? Electricity? Water? Transportation costs? Customer costs? what is the Environmental return on that investment? Cause there is an environmental cost. Dividends? Finally I can’t listen to but”the food will be cheaper “ debate because corporations have one purpose and that’s to feed the shareholders. And customers need food. It’s a bit like privatization of water, where are you gonna get it from if they charge you 800 yen for an apple or a bottle of water? It then becomes a monopoly.

I think you’re spot on in many aspects to the problem. I’m not convinced by the solution.i suppose one solution and it’s not popular and that is depopulation.

proxyJune 2  01:14 am JST

@Dr Maybe

Crop yields continue to increase around the world. And here is a link for you: https://farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2023/12/world-and-regional-trend-crop-yields-in-an-era-of-climate-change.html

Projections are now slanting towards global population to peak before 2050 so Japan and the world are not going to run out of food.

your absolutely right regarding global population. In fact we have past the tipping point because peek birth rate was past. In 1950 it was about 5, but the birth rate globally has fallen to 2.3(ish) and will continue to fall. So as much as I hate to say it , the people born in the 1950s60s70s will pass. And the total global population will fall. We just have to wait for nature. The only way we could see the world population increase further would be another medical breakthrough similar antibiotic's, and vaccines. Children that would have died of a throat infection now live. Diseases that plagued our societies are mostly assigned to history.( but these could come back). As women,have more education and opportunities, control fertility, we develop, better health care, every nations population has fallen. The only way it has increased was via immigration.