Rice shortage in Japanese supermarkets

The threat of a "mega-earthquake," a series of predicted typhoons and a week-long nationwide holiday have pushed Japanese people to buy rice, the country's staple, to the point of causing shortages. At a Tokyo grocery store, a sign seen by AFP outside the aisle read: "In order for many customers to buy, we ask you to buy one (bag of rice) per day per family." "We can't buy rice at all and there is no prospect of buying it in the near future" from distributors, lamented an employee at another store in the Japanese capital. "Customers line up before the store opens, but stacks of bags, each containing 10 kg of rice, are always sold out by morning," an Agriculture Ministry official in charge of rice distribution told AFP. A government warning on August 9 - lifted after a week - of a possible "megaseism" helped cause the rush, especially as the Japanese began a major vacation week and several typhoons were forecast for the archipelago. But these were not the only factors; lower ...