Japan in the International Food Regimes: Understanding Japanese Food Self-sufficiency Decline

Japan’s food self-sufficiency rate was 79% in 1960, but it fell down rapidly and reached 39% in 2011, the lowest among major industrialized countries. The mechanisms of this decline have been mostly explained as the result of the drastic change of dietary habits under a rapid economic growth, since the 1960s: as the economy grew steadily, the consumption of domestically produced food (e.g. rice) has decreased, while the consumption of imported food (e.g. meat, dairy products, oils) has grown constantly (i.e. ‘Bennet’s law’). Yet, evidences suggest that Japan’s foreign policy choices and international environment considerably influenced Japan’s low food self-sufficiency rate. Relying on ‘international food regime theory’, this analysis aims to shed some light on the international political factors that affected Japan’s dependence. This chapter will show how national security interests and international norms and rules that underpin the food regime have played an important in determining Japan’s low self-sufficiency rate.