Three Down, One To Go
15/03/11 -- A third explosion at Fukushima has potentially had a greater impact on the reactor inside the building than the previous two blasts, according to the BBC's website.
The exclusion zone around the plant has been increased from 20km to 30km, they say.
There are now concerns that the water inside reactor no4 may be boiling, they add.
As well as being the world's largest corn importer, Japan is also the biggest global buyer of rapeseed.
Two Down, Two To Go
14/03/11 -- Today's explosion at Fukushima reactor 3 following on from Friday's kerfuffle at reactor 1, leaves just reactors 2 & 4 unscathed so far. Apparently now reactor 2 has a problem with its cooling system too, according to this report from the Beeb: Bang.
The report goes on to say that the Japanese government is to throw over GBP100 billion at the economy to help prop it up, without going into detail about exactly where the money is going to come from.
Already heavily laden with debt are they simply going to just print it?
And what does this all mean for the grain markets? A few reports I've read this morning are making out a case for it being bullish longer-term, with regards to demand for biofuel as opposed to nuclear energy.
That may indeed be the case, but I think that longholders are far more interested in the here and now rather than whether to get a bit of 2015 wheat on their books.
Short-term this has to be bearish to my way of thinking. I can't see how Japanese imports aren't going to be affected. With major power outages starting today, and likely to continue for months, manufacturing of everything whether it's compound feed or computers has to be affected.
The knock-on effect of the world's third largest economy taking a hit of this magnitude, and the detrimental medium to longer term damage done by increasing the national debt whilst simultaneously decreasing the national output also looks pretty severe to me.
They are the world's largest importer of corn, the fourth biggest buyer of soybeans and sixth largest of wheat. And the vast majority of all that business is done with America. That has to be sufficient uncertainty to encourage a bit more scrambling for the exit door this week I'd have thought.
Did You Know?
14/03/11 -- Japan is the world's single largest corn importer by some considerable distance, buying around 16 MMT annually. An amount roughly equivalent the corn imports of Mexico AND the entire EU-27 put together.
Despite it's relatively diminutive size Japan is the sixth largest corn consumer in the world. They are also America's single biggest buyer, accounting for around 30% of all US corn exports in 2009/10. They also feature as the third largest buyer of US soybeans.
Japan Cancels Wheat Tender Again
Japan has cancelled its normal weekly wheat tender again this week due to the ongoing tainted rice saga.
Japan routinely tenders on a Tuesday for wheat, but this is now the fourth Tuesday in a row that the tender has been postponed.
Recent problems with cargoes of inferior quality wheat from China and Vietnam, and supposedly destined for glue manufacture, have caused widespread public health scares after being used in the manufacture of various food products.
Officials refused to comment on when tenders will resume or say what quality assurance measures were being considered in relation to the rice quality issue.
Japan Cancels Wheat Tender
Japan has cancelled it's normal weekly melamine, sorry wheat, tender for the second week running due to the recent contamination issues with rice. Japan's agriculture minister resigned last week over the scandal after an Osaka-based company was found early this month to have sold tons of tainted rice illegally for human consumption,
Japan feeling the economic nip in the air
The Japanese trade balance slid into deficit in August, according to data released Thursday, as sky-high oil prices ramped up import costs while exports slowed to a crawl, adding to the pain for an economy already teetering on the brink of recession, reports Reuters.
Excluding the month of January, when Japanese exports tend to drop on slower factory activity during the New Year holidays, the August results were the first monthly deficit since 1982, when Japan was reeling from the aftermath of an oil crisis.
In a further sign of trouble for an export-reliant economy, exports to the United States posted their sharpest fall ever from the same month a year earlier, while a Bank of Japan board member warned of more turmoil in the U.S. economy.
High corn price sees Japan turn to feeding food scraps
Japan disposes of around 20 million tonnes of food waste per year. The leftovers used to be dumped in landfills where they decomposed, producing methane. However government legislation since 2001 has stimulated the turning food scraps into animal feed. Initially, farmers had been reluctant to feed the recycled food, but rising feed prices have made them more receptive to it. Feed from recycled food is about half the price of regular feed.
This trend has stimulated a former garbage truck driver to set up Agri Gaia System, at the moment the largest food recycling company in Japan. His drivers now cart truckloads of rice balls, sandwiches and milk discarded by 1,200 7-Eleven stores to his factory on the outskirts of Tokyo, where the food scraps are turned into two types of dry feed after a final heating process - one rich in fat and protein, the other lower in fat and protein but with more carbohydrates - and a liquid type, from pasteurized drinks such as milk and chopped vegetables.
A blind test of pork shows respondents tell the difference immediately, according to a university research. The fat of the pigs fed recycled food is sweeter than usual. Another effect of tasty feed is that hens produce more eggs than usual.
The feed is not used for cattle or sheep because of strict health regulations that were imposed to prevent mad cow disease.
Japan imports about 75% of its raw materials from abroad. It is the world's biggest importer of corn used for animal feed. The recent price increases of corn and soy meal have raised demand for recycled feed, but it still accounts for only 1% of raw material use in Japan, or about 150,000 metric tons in 2006, twice as much as in 2003.
Japan Suspends Imports Of British Poultry Due To Bird Flu
TOKYO (AFP)--Japan said Wednesday it was suspending imports of poultry from Britain after a bird flu outbreak on a farm there.
The Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries said in a statement that the suspension was expected to be a temporary measure aimed at reducing the risk of fresh bird flu outbreaks in Japan.
The move came a day after the British authorities confirmed that avian influenza had been discovered in chickens in southern England, although it was not the virulent H5N1 strain that sometimes claims human lives.
Preliminary tests were positive for the H7 strain, which poses a low risk to humans, the British Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said in a statement posted on its Web site.
All birds on the premises where the virus was detected will be slaughtered, it added.
It is not the first time Japan has suspended imports of British poultry due to concerns about bird flu. The last time was in November. That suspension was only lifted last month.
