AICHI, Apr. 27 – Spring has come, and farmers in the Kashidani Rice Terrace in Ozu City, Ehime Prefecture, are busy flooding and preparing for the rice planting season.
Seiichi Shiromoto is a 65-year-old owner of a 1-hectare rice field. He was working hard, operating a tractor and performing preliminary tillage of the water-filled rice field. He plans to plant rice in late April, which is expected to continue for a month. The Kashidani Rice Terrace is located on the mountains at an altitude of 500 meters, with 257 rice paddies sitting next to each other and covering about 3 hectares of the side of the mountains. The farmers grow Koshihikari, a popular cultivar of Japonica rice. The region’s temperature difference between day and night gives the rice a richly sweet flavor. Seven families run the rice terraces.
Shiromoto is also a leader of the Kashidani Rice Terrace Hozonkai, a local group for preserving the rice terraces. The Hozonkai introduced a rice paddy owner system 11 years ago, which attracted 41 applicants, including some living far away in Tokyo and Kyoto Prefecture this year. Shiromoto said he is surprised at the high prices of rice. “It’s a pity that we cannot increase production, as it is hard to make new paddies here in the Kashidani Rice Terrace,” he said.
Farmers are preparing for the rice planting season at the water-filled rice paddies. (Ozu City, Ehime Prefecture)