FY2025 Japanese Direct Payment Program Status

Since FY2015, the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries has implemented the Japanese direct payment program under the Act on Promotion of the Multifunctional Functions of Agriculture, as a system to promote the fulfillment of agriculture’s multifunctional roles through community activities. The system consists of the Multifunctional Payment Grant, the Hilly and Mountainous Areas Direct Payment Grant, and the Environmentally Friendly Agriculture Direct Payment Grant.

The published materials organize FY2025 implementation data by grant and describe each program’s purpose, eligible activities, numbers of eligible municipalities and areas, and comparisons with the previous fiscal year. They also explain factors behind the declines in implementation of the Hilly and Mountainous Areas Direct Payment Grant and the Environmentally Friendly Agriculture Direct Payment Grant.

1. The Multifunctional Payment Grant supports community activities by organizations formed by farmers and others to maintain and enhance agriculture’s and rural areas’ multifunctional roles. (1) The Farmland Maintenance Payment Grant covers basic conservation activities for waterways, farm roads, and similar infrastructure. It covered 1,446 municipalities, 4 fewer than the previous fiscal year; certified agricultural land totaled 2,329,276 ha, a decrease of 473 ha.

(2) The Resource Improvement Payment Grant (community activities to improve the quality of local resources) supports minor repairs to waterways, farm roads, and similar infrastructure, as well as activities to conserve the rural environment. In addition to farmers and others, participating activity groups must include local residents. It covered 1,330 municipalities, unchanged from the previous fiscal year; certified agricultural land totaled 2,088,144 ha, an increase of 584 ha.

(3) The Resource Improvement Payment Grant (activities to extend the service life of facilities) supports activities to extend the service life of agricultural facilities. It covered 948 municipalities, 8 more than the previous fiscal year, and 822,500 ha of eligible agricultural land, an increase of 15,861 ha. Eligible agricultural land area means the area of farmland that an eligible organization designates in its project plan as covered by the grant calculation. Although more organizations began activities, the number of organizations fell due to dissolutions and other reasons, leaving the overall grant at the same level as in the previous fiscal year.

2. The Hilly and Mountainous Areas Direct Payment Grant aims to offset disadvantages in agricultural production conditions compared with flatland areas, maintain agricultural production activities, and secure multifunctional roles. It covered 991 municipalities, 12 fewer than the previous fiscal year; the agreement area, which is the area covered by activities, was 618,049 ha, a decrease of 42,907 ha.

FY2025 was the first year of the sixth-term measures. As the number of agreements fell due to factors including population aging and administrative workloads, the number of municipalities receiving payments and the agreement area also declined.

3. The Environmentally Friendly Agriculture Direct Payment Grant supports groups of farmers and others who combine efforts to reduce chemical fertilizers and pesticides by at least 50% in principle with farming activities that are highly effective in preventing global warming and conserving biodiversity. It covered 899 municipalities, 5 more than the previous fiscal year, while the area covered was 84,795 ha, a decrease of 5,820 ha. The stated reasons for the area decline were a shift to conventional farming due to labor shortages associated with population aging and farmers leaving agriculture.