I wouldn't call it "critical" like that. If robot farming became impossible for some reason, and old farmers started dying of old age in large numbers, and if there really were a shortage of farmers or farm laborers, then those who really needed their services would offer a higher wage, raising the price until some young people took it. Assuming Japan has a functioning market economy.
I wonder where this claim came from? (not sure how serious the concern you're talking about is, but let's run with it) Who benefits from persuading concerned authorities to push more young people towards farming? How about farm owners, who would have to offer higher wages to a less-competitive job pool? I wonder if they found it cheaper to just tell interviewers that the sky was falling?
Whenever you hear someone claiming an urgent economic "crisis", be suspicious. Very suspicious. With a moderately healthy market, often this just means someone will have to pay higher prices--which, as far as they're concerned, is an outrage, a scandal, and an emergency.
Edit: Googled around to figure out what stories you might have read. And, let's see:
"... Japan Agriculture (JA). With its tight links to the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and the agriculture ministry, and employing an astonishing 240,000 staff in Tokyo and around the country, the JA is probably Japan’s most powerful lobby. It campaigns to keep high import tariffs on farm goods: the tariff on rice is 777.7%, that on butter is 360%, while sugar attracts a 328% levy." http://www.economist.com/news/asia/21576154-fewer-bigger-plo...
"Shinzo Abe, Japan’s prime minister, has promised to protect “sacred cows” — including rice, beef and dairy — from the deal. Rice carries an almost spiritual significance here, not to mention a 778 percent tariff." https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/japans-farmers-face-an-...
Hahahaha, welp. Right, then, maybe you don't have a functioning market economy. That sounds to me like the real problem. I know my recommended solution. Hmm, I find it cool that I "called" that one. It's also kind of interesting to see what these Western publications are doing, and how far it leans towards uncritically swallowing the crisis story.
The Economist one is focusing on the TPP, and it is mostly critical of the JA. The Washington Post one--I give them credit for mentioning the important facts, but they exhibit no sense of their proper weight or their meaning. The article is titled "Japan’s farmers face an existential crisis", the first time they mention the agricultural lobby is in the 7th paragraph, and generally it seems like "Oh, gee, things just are that way" amid a sea of distracting details: portraits of individual farmers, their history and aging concerns, oh and by the way it takes a combined effort from the local and federal governments to "experiment" with "reform" of a few farms because they're so heavily intertwined that the government insulates them from market competition with a 4x-8x trade barrier and who knows what else, and also here's what this proud farmer has to say about his profession. Eeh. Just strikes me as bizarre.
I wonder where this claim came from? (not sure how serious the concern you're talking about is, but let's run with it) Who benefits from persuading concerned authorities to push more young people towards farming? How about farm owners, who would have to offer higher wages to a less-competitive job pool? I wonder if they found it cheaper to just tell interviewers that the sky was falling?
Whenever you hear someone claiming an urgent economic "crisis", be suspicious. Very suspicious. With a moderately healthy market, often this just means someone will have to pay higher prices--which, as far as they're concerned, is an outrage, a scandal, and an emergency.
Edit: Googled around to figure out what stories you might have read. And, let's see:
"... Japan Agriculture (JA). With its tight links to the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and the agriculture ministry, and employing an astonishing 240,000 staff in Tokyo and around the country, the JA is probably Japan’s most powerful lobby. It campaigns to keep high import tariffs on farm goods: the tariff on rice is 777.7%, that on butter is 360%, while sugar attracts a 328% levy." http://www.economist.com/news/asia/21576154-fewer-bigger-plo...
"Shinzo Abe, Japan’s prime minister, has promised to protect “sacred cows” — including rice, beef and dairy — from the deal. Rice carries an almost spiritual significance here, not to mention a 778 percent tariff." https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/japans-farmers-face-an-...
Hahahaha, welp. Right, then, maybe you don't have a functioning market economy. That sounds to me like the real problem. I know my recommended solution. Hmm, I find it cool that I "called" that one. It's also kind of interesting to see what these Western publications are doing, and how far it leans towards uncritically swallowing the crisis story.
The Economist one is focusing on the TPP, and it is mostly critical of the JA. The Washington Post one--I give them credit for mentioning the important facts, but they exhibit no sense of their proper weight or their meaning. The article is titled "Japan’s farmers face an existential crisis", the first time they mention the agricultural lobby is in the 7th paragraph, and generally it seems like "Oh, gee, things just are that way" amid a sea of distracting details: portraits of individual farmers, their history and aging concerns, oh and by the way it takes a combined effort from the local and federal governments to "experiment" with "reform" of a few farms because they're so heavily intertwined that the government insulates them from market competition with a 4x-8x trade barrier and who knows what else, and also here's what this proud farmer has to say about his profession. Eeh. Just strikes me as bizarre.