6 Reasons Why Rice Farmers Are Plummeting

Do you remember that summer when white rice was sold out at supermarkets?🌾

The "Reiwa Rice Riots" from 2024 to 2025, where rice disappeared from supermarkets across the country, shocked many people.

But in reality, this did not happen suddenly.

It was the moment when the reality of the drastic decline in rice farmers, which had been slowly progressing for decades, finally surfaced.

If you have wondered, "Why are there so few farmers left?", please read until the end.

This is a story deeply connected to your daily dining table.

🌾 How much have rice farmers decreased?

First, let's look at the reality through the numbers.

According to the "Census of Agriculture and Forestry" released by the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries in 2025, the number of agricultural management entities that planted paddy rice for sale was 538,000 entities.

Compared to five years ago, a staggering 175,000 entities (24.6%) have disappeared.

(Source: Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries "2025 Census of Agriculture and Forestry")

It is like saying one out of every four households has gone out of business.

The same can be said for agriculture as a whole.

The total number of agricultural management entities is 836,000, which is a decrease of 240,000 entities (22.3%) from five years ago.

This is one of the largest rates of decline in history.

But strangely, the number of large-scale farmers and agricultural corporations is actually increasing.

Small family-run farms are quitting one after another, and the remaining farmland is being taken over by larger management entities.

🍚 Rice consumption has dropped to less than half

In fact, the "move away from rice" began 60 years ago

To understand the background behind the decline in farmers, we must first look at rice consumption.

According to data from the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, the amount of rice consumed per person per year in Japan peaked in fiscal year 1962 at 118.3kg.

By fiscal year 2024, that figure had dropped to 53.4kg.

In fact, it has more than halved in 60 years.

• The spread of bread-based diets has led to more breakfasts without rice

• A wider variety of staple food options such as noodles and pasta have become available

• More people are avoiding carbohydrates due to diet-consciousness

• Convenient meals have become easily accessible at convenience stores and fast-food restaurants

These lifestyle changes have gradually pushed down the demand for rice.

It is only natural that it is difficult to feel a sense of future potential in growing a crop for which demand continues to shrink.

🚜 Machinery costs are too high to be profitable

Rice farming is a bundle of capital investment

To grow rice, a significant amount of agricultural machinery is required.

• Tractor (for tilling soil)

• Rice transplanter (for planting seedlings)

• Combine harvester (for harvesting rice)

• Dryer (for drying harvested rice husks)

• Rice huller (for removing husks to make brown rice)

Acquiring all of these requires an investment ranging from several million to tens of millions of yen.

Moreover, each piece of machinery is only used for a few weeks out of the year.

According to the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries' "Crop Statistics Survey," the total production cost per 10a for rice produced in 2024 is 132,112 yen, and per 60kg, it is 15,814 yen.

(Source: Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, "Survey on Agricultural Management Statistics: Agricultural Production Costs")

The smaller the rice field, the heavier the depreciation cost of machinery (recording the purchase price as an expense little by little each year) becomes, making it difficult to retain any profit.

The structure is such that the larger the farmland you own, the more profitable it becomes.

👴 The average age of farmers is 69.2 years old

The "Will I do this for another 10 years?" barrier

When you hear about aging, you might think, "Isn't that something that's been said for a long time?"

However, that problem is currently reaching its peak.

According to 2024 data, there are 1.114 million "core agricultural workers" (people who primarily carry out farming) nationwide.

Of those, 71.7% are 65 or older, and the average age is 69.2 years old.

In the fields of rice cultivation and fruit farming, the ratio of those 70 and older is considered to be even higher.

Try to imagine it.

When a farmer around 70 years old thinks, "It costs several million yen to replace a combine harvester. Should I do this for another 10 years...?" isn't it natural that many choose to retire from farming?

Furthermore, with the "2025 problem" overlapping, where the baby boomer generation (born 1947–49) becomes late-stage elderly, a mass retirement of farmers is now becoming a reality.

👶 Young people do not choose rice cultivation

The real reason there are no successors

There are many farmers who think, "If only my child would take over the farm..."

However, how does rice farming appear to the younger generation?

• Rice prices are easily influenced by the market and collection prices, making it difficult to set your own unit price

• With vegetables, fruits, livestock, and processed sales, high revenue can be targeted through ingenuity

• Young people entering farming are more likely to choose high-unit-price crops that allow for smart agriculture and direct sales

• Rice farming has high machinery costs and is also highly dependent on the weather

If you are going to do agriculture, it is only natural to want to choose a more profitable field.

As a result, the number of successors for rice farming continues to decline.

📋 Policies have become unstable

Farmers tossed about by "increase it" and "decrease it"

Japan's rice policy has repeatedly changed direction throughout its long history.

It has been pointed out that the former "acreage reduction policy" (a policy to intentionally suppress production volume) has affected farmers' motivation to produce for many years.

Even now, the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries supports conversion to feed rice, wheat, soybeans, etc., as "direct payment subsidies for paddy field utilization."

• Market signals saying "we want you to increase rice production"

• Policy direction saying "we want you to proceed with crop conversion"

• Farmer confusion over "which one should I invest in?"

In agriculture, where long-term capital investment is required, the difficulty in reading policy direction is one of the major factors why farmers choose to leave farming.

🌡️ Climate risk is increasing year by year

The battle against extreme heat, heavy rain, and pests

In recent years, farmers have been troubled by the increasing risk of climate change.

The extreme heat of 2024 caused "high-temperature damage" to rice (where rice grains become cloudy or yields drop due to high temperatures), leading to a decline in quality and a substantial supply shortage.

This was one of the direct triggers for the "Reiwa Rice Riots."

• Yield and quality decline due to high-temperature damage from extreme heat

• Risk of being unable to plant at all due to drought or heavy rain

• Increased damage from the emergence of new pests and diseases

Rice is Japan's staple food, and the social responsibility is significant.

However, the structure is such that farmers bear the risks of weather, quality, and price almost entirely on their own.

The weight of those risks is a factor that encourages farmers to leave the industry.

🌏 What will happen to the Japanese dining table in the future?

Even if farmland is consolidated, there is a shortage of labor.

Farmland abandoned by small farmers is being taken over by large-scale agricultural management entities and agricultural corporations.

According to the 2025 Census of Agriculture and Forestry, management entities with 20 hectares or more account for about 50% of all farmland.

At first glance, one might think that "efficiency is improving, which is good."

But the problem is that it doesn't mean everything will work out.

• It is difficult to find successors for mountainous areas or farmland with poor conditions

• If abandoned farmland increases, future rice supply capacity will drop

• Even with large-scale operations, problems of labor shortages and aging remain

In regions where farmland consolidation is not progressing, abandoned farmland is increasing rapidly.

Beyond that lies the risk that Japan's very capacity to supply rice will decline.

📝 Summary

The reasons why the number of rice farmers is plummeting are not limited to just one.

Rice consumption has dropped to less than half in 60 years, machinery costs are too heavy for small-scale farmers, the average age of farmers has risen to 69.2 with no successors, young people are choosing more profitable agriculture over rice farming, policy direction is difficult to stabilize, and climate risks are growing every year.

These six factors are compounding, and the "business model" of small-scale family-run rice farms is reaching its limit.

What is happening now is not just a decrease in the number of farmers, but a turning point where the entire structure of Japanese rice farming is about to change significantly.

The era where we could assume "someone else will take care of agriculture" is slowly coming to an end.

We need to think about the future of rice.🍚