By NOBUFUMI YAMADA/ Staff Writer
March 30, 2025 at 17:31 JST
A bag containing stockpiled rice offered by a Yokohoma supermarket (Ippei Minetoshi)
The first rice from government stockpiles hit store shelves on March 29 although there was nothing on the label to indicate its origin.
A supermarket in Yokohama offered 5-kilogram bags of domestically grown rice for 3,542 yen ($23.60), about 1,000 yen cheaper than other varieties, such as Koshihikari and Akitakomachi.
The rice was a blend of several varieties. The release of government stockpiled grain came amid skyrocketing prices of the food staple caused by disruption in the distribution chain.
The Yokohama supermarket admitted that stockpiled rice was mixed with other varieties before being bagged.
Specific rice varieties detail the origin of the product on the bag label. But that was not the case for the stockpiled rice since it was a mixture of varieties from around Japan.
The National Federation of Agricultural Cooperative Associations (Zen-Noh) had asked that the stockpiled rice not be so labeled to avoid confusion among retail outlets.
Fukuoka-based Trial Holdings Inc. operates a supermarket chain in the Kyushu and Chubu regions and was planning to offer stockpiled rice due to the general shortage of the staple.
It plans to offer blended rice until mid-April.
The farm ministry released stockpiled rice harvested in 2023 and 2024.
Other supermarkets were less forthcoming about whether they plan to offer mixtures of stockpiled rice on their store shelves. In response to questions from The Asahi Shimbun, many supermarkets either said no decision had been made or refused comment about offering stockpiled rice.
JA Zen-Noh A-Coop, which operates supermarkets around Japan, released a statement that said, “We will refrain from responding in order to avoid having specific outlets become the target for reporting by the media.”
An official with a supermarket in the greater Tokyo metropolitan area said it was difficult to provide a clear explanation because it did not know if it would be able to actually purchase any of the stockpiled rice.
“This is probably an attempt to avoid having only cheap stockpiled rice sold or disappearing from store shelves because consumers flock to only those outlets that provide it,” said an official with a rice wholesaler.
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