The Japanese Government decided the basic post-disaster reconstruction policy for next five years at the Cabinet meeting on the fifth anniversary day of the Great East Japan Earthquake, March 11.
Regarding measures to be taken for revitalizing agricultural production in the disaster-hit areas, the Government plans to complete recovery works of farmlands by 2020 and further promote enlargements of farmland lots through exchanges of those lots among farmers concerned.
In the areas stricken by the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, where the reconstruction works have been delayed, the administration places major emphases on accelerating radiocesium decontamination from farmlands as well as on taking active measures to eliminate harmful rumors against farm products shipped from those areas.
The basic five-year reconstruction policy confirms that rehabilitation of the industrial sector has steadily progressed in past five years. In the next five-year period of reconstruction and revitalization, the Government aims to take appropriate measures to facilitate self-revitalization in the disaster-hit areas not only by carefully addressing challenges to be met by those areas, but also by responding to their various needs during the next five years.
With regard to the agricultural sector, 74 percent of devastated farmlands, some 20,000 hectares, have been recovered in earthquake-hit prefectures as of January 31, 2016. Enlargements of farmland lots, which are emphasized in the basic reconstruction policy, are expected to be important steps toward a newly growth-oriented agriculture by encouraging farmers’ labor-saving and cost reduction.
(March 12, 2016)