May 21 (UPI) – The Japanese Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, or Farms Taki Eto decreased on Wednesday after his comments about the price of rice led to a national recoil.
Eto wrote on his website that he inteuds his dismissal with Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, who accepted it.
“My comments were extremely inappropriate in a time when the audience suffers enormously from the rising prices of rice, and for that I offer my sincere apologies,” Eto.
ETO made the comments on Sunday a weekend fundraising event, where he said during a speech that he had never bought rice because he receives so many from his supporters.
“I have enough rice at home, I could open and sell a store,” he said.
He later said that the comment was made for the joke, but withdrew it and admitted that the joke was 'too far'.
The foreign agricultural service of the US Department of Agriculture reported in March that rice “prices have continued to worry and are almost 80% higher in January 2025 than a year ago.”
The Ministry of Boerderij responded to the price of rice with the release of 300,000 tons of reserved rice up to and including July. The government had already released 321,000 tons of rice between March and April, because rice prices rose dramatically in 2025.
Ishiba is said to punish ETO on Monday, but on Tuesday the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan concluded an agreement with four other opposition parties to stipulate that ETO is purchasing and together to submit a motion without trust against him.
Representative Yoshihiko Noda, leader of the CDP, said on Wednesday that the remarks of Eto “did not show attention to people's life, those suffering while rice prices rise, and they rubbed the audience in the wrong way”, and that Eto, in his opinion, “does not show a sense of crisis about the current situation,” and “not suitable to be a minister”.
