Case Study: Food Production

Shonai Plain

Basic Facts:

• Shonai Plain is located near the Japan Sea, in the northwest of Yamagata prefecture.
• Rice farming involves growing crops so is arable farming.
• It is a very large plain: 100km in the southeast and 40km in the northwest.
• It is one of Japan’s major grain-producing areas and in the Edo period rice for the government came from here.
• It has the most ideal climate conditions for rice production in Japan, with relatively high temperatures and long durations of sunshine especially in August when daylight hours are the longest in Japan.
• The melted snow in spring and the water that has been purified by the beech forest in the Three Mountains of Dewa and Mt. Chokai flow into the Shonai region, creating a great source of water for rice production.

Input:

• The rice cycle starts around the time the long winter is over, when the cherry blossoms start to turn reddish. 
• Just at the break of March, farmers start to “wake up” the fields. To produce top-quality rice, it is necessary to have top-quality soil.

Output:

• The planted seedlings then take root, and new stems grow out from the buds near the root and the rice head emerges from the buds of the stem. 
• Eventually, the bud of a flower is created in the ear of rice.

Process:

• They till the soil and layer in straw to loosen up the soil and make it easy for water to percolate in.
• To get strong plants, you need to grow strong seedlings. In spring, farmers tend to their seedlings. They take unhulled grains of “seed rice” from last year’s harvest and sow them in water until they sprout. While this is happening, they also conduct the minute work of disinfecting and drying the paddy, and fertilizer is applied after the seedlings sprout and reach a certain size.
• Finally, it’s time to prepare the fields for planting. Water is added, fertilizer applied, and the ground is graded into a smooth surface. It’s important to keep the water at a consistent depth so the seedlings can be planted at the same level.
• When the summer sun starts to make itself felt, farmers pick a still, warm day and plant the 4-5-inch seedlings in the field. In the past, farmers did this by hand, planting each stalk one by one, but today it’s general practice to use a rice-planting machine.