The above is a very general explanation, but we can see the "rice shortage" (or decrease in stores) does not find its only cause in unavoidable things like frost damage, but is due largely to the gratuitous meddling of the city. Postscript Without really planning it, I touched upon something I am going to cover in Chapter V, "Down with the Cities!", so I would like to mention here that by "Down with the cities!" I do not mean "Down with the people in the cities!" This I shall treat in detail in Chapter V. SPECIAL CHAPTER NOTES 14 This chapter was written at the time the Japanese government imported rice from South Korea. The government suddenly discovered that it had no reserves of rice except for very old stores, unacceptable because of the high level of bromine (caused by fumigants). (Translator's note) 15 Some groups of farmers went down to the ports during the unloading of the South Korean rice to protest. The January, 1985 issue of Gendai Nogyo ("Modern Agriculture") published a photo story about some young farmers in Miyagi Prefecture who protested the government's policies by producing all the rice they could. (Translator's note) 16 If harvesting rice is a sacred occupation, then a snake's capture of a frog is also a sacred occupation. There were originally no human occupations which could be considered sacred. 17 It was at a time when China carried on no trade with other countries that they said, "Though we have a nine years' store of rice, it is still insufficient" (of course, at that time other countries were also incapable of exporting). However, at present, when arable land all over the globe is eroding and being otherwise ruined, and the population is growing explosively, there is no doubt that food for human beings is heading for insufficiency. Though for Japan imports are still possible, it will become difficult to import in the future, and we will be in the same position as ancient China. When such a food crisis results, we must not allow the money economy to interfere with food storage. Also, since money serves as the lubricant by which all the city's evils arise, we must get rid of it sooner or later. 18 Debts are an excellent means of exploitation. In order to pay back their loans, the farmers must work themselves into the ground and offer large amounts of animal products. CHAPTER III The City and the Country In Chapter II we learned that as long as the cities continue to exist, urban pollution -- which is the product of the cities' activities -- is unavoidable. We also learned that urban pollution is at the same time the pollution of the Earth, and that, other than the cities, there can be no other destroyer and contaminator of the Earth.