Since Japan, despite the strong opposition of the international community, the implementation of the Fukushima nuclear contaminated water discharge plan, China immediately banned the import of Japanese aquatic products, and then South Korea, Malaysia and other countries also carried out corresponding import controls, seeing that no one cares about unsalable aquatic products in China, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida is anxious, even if he takes the lead in eating Fukushima seafood, the launch of the "five pillars of fishery protection" plan and other remedial measures, it is difficult to hide the depression of Japan's fishing industry.
Just when Japan was desperately looking for a home, it was unexpectedly publicly slapped in the face by South Korea. According to South Korean media reports quoted by the Observer Network on December 27, the South Korean government responded on the 26th that the South Korean government will maintain import controls on the South Korean side regardless of Japan's plan. In addition, South Korea will continue to maintain a strict attitude in the testing of radioactive materials. To put it simply, one yard to one yard, although under the leadership of the United States, the United States, Japan and South Korea alliance relations are getting closer and closer, but in specific affairs, especially when it comes to food safety, South Korea will not "open the net" to Japan, otherwise the South Korean government will be scolded by the people again, after all, Japan's behavior of discharging nuclear contaminated water into the sea has also impacted the South Korean fishery, and fishermen have long complained bitterly.
It is worth mentioning that in the past, the Chinese market carried more than half of the output of Japanese scallop exports, and now in order to save the scallop industry, Japan has roughly tossed two sets of plans, one is to look forward to other countries other than China to take over, including the European Union, as well as South Korea, Thailand and other countries, Japan has deliberately set a target for the export of aquatic products, by 2025, taking scallops as an example, Japan's target is 65.6 billion yen, of which the total amount of exports to the European Union and South Korea is more than 4 billion yen.
The second is to shell the scallops and then export, of course, the core factory of this new supply chain can not be placed in Japan, in order to hide people's eyes, Japan aimed at Thailand and other places, as for the final export, Japan chose the United States and other countries, this move can be described as another "stinky move", you must know that although the United States is supporting Japan on the surface, but as early as before Japan implemented the first round of nuclear contaminated water discharge, it secretly "retreated" Judging from the official data released by Japan, the United States was the country that reduced the import of Japanese agricultural, forestry and aquatic products the most in the first half of this year, and the main production areas of the three main food products were all in the area affected by the discharge of nuclear contaminated water.
It has to be said that the problem of unsalable aquatic products is only a microcosm of Japan's economic recession, and there has been bad news in Japan recently. According to a report by the global network on December 27, citing Japanese media on the 26th, the Japanese Cabinet Office released the annual accounting report of the national economy on the 25th, and Japan's per capita nominal GDP in 2023 is expected to be 33,900 US dollars, which is expected to rank 34th among 190 countries and regions with data. Among the 38 member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Japan fell from 20th place in 2021 to 21st place in 2022. It is reported that Japan's data ranks at the bottom of the G7 countries. Not only that, as Japan's economy goes downhill, Japan's international economic status will become more and more "sideline", from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) October forecast, with the dollar as the unit of measurement, Japan's GDP will be surpassed by Germany this year, even Japan's Daiichi Life Economics Research Institute Chief Economist Hideo Kumano also gave a pessimistic judgment, if the trend of accelerated depreciation of the yen is difficult to contain, Japan's GDP will be overtaken by India and the United Kingdom in a few years.
Seeing this situation, some Japanese netizens asked their souls: Why is it that they have worked hard all their lives but their productivity is so low? In this regard, some Japanese scholars have attributed this economic predicament to the declining birthrate and aging population and long-term monetary easing, with the former restricting local labor and the latter dragging down the technological innovation of local enterprises.
In addition, we have noticed that in recent times, the Abe faction of the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan has continued to ferment the "kickback" scandal, and the Kishida cabinet has suffered a "big change", which also affects the implementation of relevant policies to a certain extent, and these negative factors are transmitted to the people, that is, the cost of survival has risen sharply, it is reported that there are more than 30,000 kinds of food prices in Japan this year, and some Japanese media even compare this year to the "year of price increases". In view of the current predicament, if Kishida takes the initiative to stop the discharge of nuclear-contaminated water and repair relations with the outside world, then increasing exports and boosting the economy is a good way out, otherwise he will continue to be haunted by the bitter fruits and get closer and closer to stepping down.