Pan-Pacific Conference XXXIV. Designing New Business Models in Developing Economies

Standard Sake has been circulated by the popular
name of “rice wine” outside Japan.
Taking this circumstance into consideration, it
should be conceivable that Sake makes its world
stage debut as a premium brand product “Sake”
through differentiation by presenting its rich
varieties of classified Sakes & its painstaking
elaborate producing process.
Given this way, it is imperative for the tourism
industry to collaborate with other sectors like
agriculture, commerce, and technology for its
development. And other partnership will arise in the
evolving process of the tourism industry.
Preliminary study - special types of rice as
ingredients of sake
The highly qualified reputed Sake needs selected
special types of rice (Sakamai) to keep its quality.
The distribution map of recent “Sakamai”
production shows 36% “Yamada Nishiki (Hyogo
Area)”, 24% “Gohyakumangoku (Niigata Area)”,
7% “Miyama Nishiki (Akita Area), 3% “Omachi
(Okayama Area), and 29% other types. Among
these “Sakamai” used to make Sake, “Yamada
Nishiki” receives the highest reputation &
evaluation, the features of which make it self best
fitte to Sake brewing. This type of rice has large
“Shinnpaku” (opaque core part of a rice grain) and
its grain has hard outside &soft inside with less
protein component.
Accordingly, I picked up “Yamada Nishiki” as an
object of the study and started investigation at its
original birthplace – Yamada Special A, Miki City
&Yokawa City, Hyogo Prefecture -.“Yamada
Nishiki” is taller & has less water component than
other types of rice. Due to this feature it is feeble
against strong wind like Typhoon. It needs proper
soil revitalization in order to absorb lipid to make its
stem strong. The most important procedure in the
process of fortifying stems is mixing up soils with
rich minerals after the harvest every year. “Zeolite”
from Iwayama (Fukushima Pre.) is also mixed with
soils in order to grow larger “Shinpaku.”
When rice seedlings are transplanted, farmers
must leave enough space for sunlight to reach as far
as the bottom part of stems and for the wind to blow
through stems to protect from worms & diseases.
“Nagata farming method (a kind of Spartan
farming)” is another peculiarity. Farmers do nothing
but cultivating soils after harvest and watering soils
before/after transplanting. Remaining part is taken
care by sunlight. It is close to nature farming.
Suitable place for this farming method is where it
is hot during the daytime and cool in both morning
& evening. Extreme temperature swings are said to
be ideal for growing Sake rice. This is the reason
why mountainous areas and mountain valleys with
long autumn season are right places. Farmers wait
the timing when fully ripened rice grains wither
some 15% from its peak to cut for getting the best
rice grains for Sake. Therefore, it is almost
impossible for farmers who plants rice on a level
paddy field to grow “Sakamai”. Sakamai requires
peculiar geographical features as mentioned above.
It is generally known that Koji (rice-malt),
Shubo(yeast mash), Moromi (main marsh) are
indispensable three components for sake brewing.
“Yamada Nishiki” reveals its advantage in this
process, too. It fitted well to produce “funguscontaining
malt” which is necessary for
fermentation of rice.
“Muramai system” has been formed by mutual
consent since 1890 as an effective adjuster between
supply side – farmers - and demand side -
breweries. But due to repeated changes of
government policy on Sake & of taxation system,
direct deals between farmers & breweries have been
diminished recently. Under the circumstances, “JA”
(The National Federation of Agricultural
Cooperative Associations) has supported this
“Muramai system” as an intermediary agent
between the both parties. Looking into “Miki city”
and “Yokawa city Yamada Nishiki special zone A”
(both in Hyogo Pre.), 37 farmers & 9 breweries
have dealings by using “Muramai system”. Then,
what should be done now to make this system more
effectively and efficiently?
Introducing “SCM (Supply Chain Management)”
is worth being considered. SMC is an excellent new
business idea combined “JIT (Toyota Just in Time)
slogan with “BOT (Build to Order)” devised by
“DELL”. It is a “hybrid” business idea bringing
workload reduction, inventory reduction, and
smooth cash flows, which enables both parties
concerned to reduce the cost effectively.
Simultaneously, implementation of this idea
improves customers satisfaction and put a hallmark
on products.
Success factors of SCM (Supply Chain
Management) & “Muramai” (Made to Order
contract) Collaboration
“Muramai” system between rice farmers and sake
brewers has worked smoothly so that supply &
demand balance can be held lately. However,
keeping the balance in equilibrium is not as easy as
it seems to be even if the system is based on “made
to order” contract. When compared to the past
statistics covering all Japan, the amount of Sake
consumption has been decreasing unceasingly.
Annual consumption of Sake in 1980 showed 1.5
million kiloliters and in 2008 showed 631 kiloliters.
This demonstrates the fact the decrease rate has
reached as much as 60% for the last 30 years.
The study area chosen above is no exception to
this downward trend. There has happened a
situation that a portion of harvested rice was not
shipped notwithstanding “Muramai system”, the
cause of which was the decrease of ordered quantity
resulting from reorganization of “Nada gogo Sake
Brewers association”. There happened another case
that sales slump in Nada Sake stopped contracted
brewers buying rice and that unpurchased rice was
piled up in “JA” warehouse. What was worse, “JA”
dared to sell out the dead “Yamada Nishiki” mixed
with other type of stored rice at lower price to non-
Nada breweries.
This transaction has given negative impact on
rice farmers. Not knowing the whereabouts of
rice they have grown or witnessing their rice
decaying day after day is discouraging facts. Their
quality control was at stake.
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