“Aging farmers are threatening the sustainability of agricultural communities in Japan as the population globally is expanding and raising the need to boost food production to meet demand,” Moriyama said in his opening remarks to the seven-member meeting. “We, as the members of the Group of Seven nations, share common problems and want to discuss them together for a solution.”analyst at JSC Corp., researcher in Tokyo.
As the average age of farmers globally creeps higher and retirement looms, Japan has a solution: robots and driver-less tractors.
U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has warned that left unchecked, aging farmers could threaten the ability to produce the food the world needs. The average age of growers in developed countries is now about 60, according to the United Nations. Japan plans to spend 4 billion yen ($36 million) in the year through March to promote farm automation and help develop 20 different types of robots, including one that separates over-ripe peaches when harvesting.
“There are no other options for farmers but to rely on technologies developed by companies if they want to raise productivity while they are graying,” said Makiko Tsugata, senior analyst at Mizuho Securities Co. in Tokyo. “The government should help them adopt new technologies.”
The amount of uncultivated farmland in Japan almost doubled in the past two decades, reaching 420,000 hectares in 2015, as farmers retired, data from the ministry show. About 65 percent of growers are 65 years or older. The dearth of young people willing to take up farming has increased concerns that Japan’s reliance on food imports will deepen, with the nation already getting about 60 percent of its food supplies from overseas.
