Press translations [Japan]. Economic Series 0020, 1945-11-27.

Full translation:

Recently the shortage of coal and sodium has been one of the obstacles in soap production. As each factory has its own problem, the Commerce and Industry Ministry is making every effort to stimulate production by dispatching its officials to each important factory. In the case of ASAHI Electrification Company there is a shortage of coal but not of sodium. Nippon Industrial Chemicals Company has coal in stock but suffers from the lack of sodium.

The investigation section of the Ministry has inspected important factories such as the OJI factory of NISSAN, the OGU factory of ASAHI AZUMA Electrification Company, the factory of the KAO Soap Company, HIRAI factory of Lion Soap Company and others, in an effort to find out how they manage to operate at this time.

Obstacles are not merely in the shortage of coal and sodium but various factors concerning the price. The price of soap having become a real problem, the ministry will try to think out some measure to alleviate this difficulty.

Summary:

In order to solve the price problem which is facing it, the Government has decided to establish a Price of Commodities Section in the Ministry of Finance as an agency for the consolidation of price policy. The Cabinet will soon confer on the matter and it is expected that this section will begin its activities on the 24th or 25th of this month. A principal aim of the Section is to set up long range plans for determining the prices of various commodities.

Appropriate officials of the Ministries concerned as well as nonofficial persons from outside the Ministries will be selected as members of the Section. The chief of the Section will also be someone chosen from outside these Ministries.

ECONOMIC SERIES: 20 (Continued)

Summary:

The daily average of applications for loans by salaried people at SHOMIN GINKO has increased to fifty, doubling the figure of last month. Seventy per cent of the loans are made because of increased living costs. Ninety per cent of the borrowers are employees of business firms and public servants, who are in difficulty because of having to buy at black market prices. Ten per cent of the loans are made to persons engaging in some form of enterprise, while six per cent are for the construction of huts by those who have lost their homes during the war.

Emergency loans for war sufferers and loans for Japanese repatriates from overseas, to whom the maximum amount being given is 500 yen have been converted to "The Loan for Living Expense." This allows the borrower an advance amounting to 2,000 yen. The amount of the loans required is from 2,000 yen to 3,000 yen; formerly it was around 1,000 yen. Return payments thus far have been made satisfactorily, averaging 99.50 per cent.

Summary:

Reform of the agricultural land system has been rather difficult because of its political connection but the abolition of tenant farming has been realized to a certain extent through prices of farm products. A gradation was set up on prices between the buying price of the Government and the price fixed for the consumers, landlords and tillers in accordance with the Foodstuff Control Law. The basic rice price for landlords, producers, and consumers was raised from 38 yen to 43 yen per koku in November, 1939. In 194l the price for landlords was raised to 47 yen and that for the producers to 62.50 yen. In April of this year the price for landlords was fixed at 55 yen and that for the producers at 92.50 yen. New prices have not yet been fixed, but it is likely that the price for the producers will be fixed at 150 yen.

The Foodstuff Control Law provides that tenant fees should be paid in kind to landlords, but, as a matter of fact, the tenants will have to deliver their rice to the Government and get money from the Government for the rice. Then the tenant farmers pay the necessary money to their landlords. Naturally, the landlords now find it difficult to get rice from tenant farmers and they get it only through their own stocks. The tenant fees thus are actually lowered. Truly, a great change had come over the tenant fees principally for rice production during the wartime. The substantial reduction of tenant fees had been the result of the enforcement on the control of tenant fees and land price and various wartime controls and restrictions, including the price gradation, on the basis of the Foodstuff Control Law. Still, the tenant farming system itself remains unrevised at its foundation.

Here is the measure adopted by the Government for the maintenance of landed farming. The Government has been enforcing it chiefly for the purpose of improving the farmers' condition without directly touching

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ECONOMIC SERIES: 20 (Continued)

ITEM 4(Continued)

the reform of the agricultural land system, but it intends to realize the same effects through indirect means. According to the measure, the Government lends capital at low interest rate to farmers, gives encouragement funds and some subsidies to lessen the burden of interest payments.

During the last 19 years, since 1926, the Government has made loans aggregating 380,000,000 yen to 378,000 families which, as the result, have established themselves as landed farmers over land covering about 250,000 chobu. During 1944 the Government made especially strenuous efforts on the measure with the result that 58,000 additional families were able to make themselves landed farmers owning land covering 43,000 chobu. However, money advanced by the Government for the purpose was far less than that for the preceding year. The money advanced last year amounted to 99,000,000 yen in striking contrast to 237,000,000 yen advanced to 15,000 families covering 10,000 chobu for 1943. This sharp drop in the amount of money advanced is noteworthy in that it was brought about by the abnormal economic boom visiting agricultural villages in recent years. Because of this economic prosperity, farmers find it unnecessary to borrow money from the Government to raise themselves to the status of landed farmers. They can afford to do so with their own money. All of the farmers who have borrowed the money from the Government are not necessarily tenant farmers, as landed larmors did so too, in order to make their situation better.

The largest number involved in the buying of land was, of course, those who were ambitious of becoming landed-farmers. Those who were induced to buy land through persuasion of city, town or village offices for the establishment of landed farming were far less in number. Of course, landlords and landed farmers were the principal sellers, while the percentage of buyers during 1943 was 21.8 per cent of landed farmers, 39.5 per cent of small-scale landed farmers, and 20.1 per cent of tenant farmers. The percentage of tenant farmers increased sharply over that of 13 per cent for 1940 or 194l. Many tenant-farmers, finding themselves in financial stress, caused their former landlords to buy back the land. This situation is open to criticism, as it is known that the percentage of this buying back comprises 18 per cent of all transactions. However, now land buying by farmers wholly with their own money is rapidly increasing with larger agricultural income.

The average acreage of land bought is 2.9 tan for rice land and 2.2 tan for land for other crops. The average land price is 547 yen per tan for rice land and 262 yen for land for other crops.

The establishment of landed farming thus had made some headway during the war. Tenant farmers have bought land from landlords at comparatively low prices through efforts of government offices, by taking advantage of the low interest rate capita1 of the Government, by commercial unions, or with their own money.

However, the actual acreage of land thus bought was only 1.64 per cent, as of January, 1943, out of the total cultivated land acreage of 2,610,000 chobu, consisting of tenant land, rice-land, land for other crops, and mulberry plantations. Still worse is the fact that, some farmers are selling back their land to former owners, as they find it unable to maintain landed farming. This fact often gives

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ECONOMIC SERIES: 20 (Continued)

ITEM 4 (Continued)

rise to opposition raised in various quarters against the enterprise of establishing landed farming. High land prices interfere with the establishment of landed-farming.

The per tan acreage land price for 1943 was 587 yen (contrasted to 521 yen for 1943) for rice-land and 374 yen (contrasted to 344 yen for 1943) for land for other crops. Prices had been falling since 1940, but again started on the upward trend in 1943. This was particularly the case with the price of non-rice land.

Extract:

Thanks to the timely supply of sweet potatoes, the anxious period of rice shortage has been tided over peacefully. Then bow long will the supply of sweet potatoes last and what are the plans of TOKYO-TO for the time after sweat potatoes have been consumed?

About then critical questions Mr. ISHWARA, Head of the Economic Bureau of TOKYO-TO gave the following opinion:

"The distribution of sweet potatoes will be finished by the end of this month, or, at latest, by the first ten days of December. After that time the farmers will not sell that product at any price. TOKYO-TO planned to collect 14, 400,000 kan of sweet potatoes from her neighboring prefectures as rice substitutes, and 13,720,000 kan as vegetables. Besides, 8,000,000 kan of sweet potatoes were promised by local counties of TOKYO-TO. The total was estimated at 36,120,000 kan. Of this figure 24,000,000 kan have been collected already.

"There remains the vital issue of what to do after these potatoes have gone? At that point we shall have to depend mainly upon the supply of fish from HOKKAIDO and other provinces. Already the shipment of fish has much improved. This will be furthered when the obstacle of the many control measures has been lifted. Production and storing of refrigerated vegetables, paste of arum root, pickles, salted greens, and dried radish are being encouraged. It is needless to speak about our efforts to assure deliveries of rice in order to maintain 2.1 go daily distribution to citizens of this city. For this purpose, Governor HIROSE and other principal officials of the municipality will visit related provinces, starting on 16 November.

"In return for the above noted rice deliveries, the municipality will reenforce the plan of countershipping wine, tobacco, vegetable oils, and other necessities like farm shoos to rice producers."

DISTRIBUTION "X"

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