The triple disaster that struck Japan in March 2011 forced people living there to confront new risks in their lives. Despite the Japanese government’s reassurance that radiation exposure would be small and unlikely to affect the health of the general population, many questioned the government’s commitment to protecting their health. The disaster prompted them to become vigilant about limiting their risk exposure, and food emerged as a key area where citizens could determine their own levels of acceptable risk. Food Safety after Fukushima examines the process by which notions about what is safe to eat were formulated after the nuclear meltdown. Its central argument is that as citizens informed themselves about potential risks, they also became savvier in their assessment of the government’s handling of the crisis. The author terms this “Scientific Citizenship,” and he shows that the acquisition of scientific knowledge on the part of citizens resulted in a transformed relationship between individuals and the state. Groups of citizens turned to existing and newly formed organizations where food was sourced from areas far away from the nuclear accident or screened to stricter standards than those required by the state. These organizations enabled citizens to exchange information about the disaster, meet food producers, and work to establish networks of trust where food they considered safe could circulate. Based on extensive fieldwork and interviews with citizens groups, mothers’ associations, farmers, government officials, and retailers, Food Safety after Fukushima reflects on how social relations were affected by the accident. The author vividly depicts an environment where trust between food producers and consumers had been shaken, where people felt uneasy about their food choices and the consequences they might have for their children, and where farmers were forced to deal with the consequences of pollution that was not of their making. Most poignantly, the book conveys the heavy burden now attached to the name “Fukushima” in the popular imagination and explores efforts to resurrect it.

The triple disaster that struck Japan in March 2011 forced people living there to confront new risks in their lives. Despite the Japanese government’s reassurance that radiation exposure would be small and unlikely to affect the health of the general population, many questioned the government’s commitment to protecting their health. The disaster prompted them to become vigilant about limiting their risk exposure, and food emerged as a key area where citizens could determine their own levels of acceptable risk. Food Safety after Fukushima examines the process by which notions about what is safe to eat were formulated after the nuclear meltdown. Its central argument is that as citizens informed themselves about potential risks, they also became savvier in their assessment of the government’s handling of the crisis. The author terms this “Scientific Citizenship,” and he shows that the acquisition of scientific knowledge on the part of citizens resulted in a transformed relationship between individuals and the state. Groups of citizens turned to existing and newly formed organizations where food was sourced from areas far away from the nuclear accident or screened to stricter standards than those required by the state. These organizations enabled citizens to exchange information about the disaster, meet food producers, and work to establish networks of trust where food they considered safe could circulate. Based on extensive fieldwork and interviews with citizens groups, mothers’ associations, farmers, government officials, and retailers, Food Safety after Fukushima reflects on how social relations were affected by the accident. The author vividly depicts an environment where trust between food producers and consumers had been shaken, where people felt uneasy about their food choices and the consequences they might have for their children, and where farmers were forced to deal with the consequences of pollution that was not of their making. Most poignantly, the book conveys the heavy burden now attached to the name “Fukushima” in the popular imagination and explores efforts to resurrect it.

The triple disaster that struck Japan in March 2011 forced people living there to confront new risks in their lives. Despite the Japanese government’s reassurance that radiation exposure would be small and unlikely to affect the health of the general population, many questioned the government’s commitment to protecting their health. The disaster prompted them to become vigilant about limiting their risk exposure, and food emerged as a key area where citizens could determine their own levels of acceptable risk. Food Safety after Fukushima examines the process by which notions about what is safe to eat were formulated after the nuclear meltdown. Its central argument is that as citizens informed themselves about potential risks, they also became savvier in their assessment of the government’s handling of the crisis. The author terms this “Scientific Citizenship,” and he shows that the acquisition of scientific knowledge on the part of citizens resulted in a transformed relationship between individuals and the state. Groups of citizens turned to existing and newly formed organizations where food was sourced from areas far away from the nuclear accident or screened to stricter standards than those required by the state. These organizations enabled citizens to exchange information about the disaster, meet food producers, and work to establish networks of trust where food they considered safe could circulate. Based on extensive fieldwork and interviews with citizens groups, mothers’ associations, farmers, government officials, and retailers, Food Safety after Fukushima reflects on how social relations were affected by the accident. The author vividly depicts an environment where trust between food producers and consumers had been shaken, where people felt uneasy about their food choices and the consequences they might have for their children, and where farmers were forced to deal with the consequences of pollution that was not of their making. Most poignantly, the book conveys the heavy burden now attached to the name “Fukushima” in the popular imagination and explores efforts to resurrect it.

Following the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant disaster in 2011 many concerned citizens—particularly mothers—were unconvinced by the Japanese government’s assurances that the country’s food supply was safe. They took matters into their own hands, collecting their own scientific data that revealed radiation-contaminated food. In Radiation Brain Moms and Citizen Scientists Aya Hirata Kimura shows how, instead of being praised for their concern about their communities’ health and safety, they faced stiff social sanctions, which dismissed their results by attributing them to the work of irrational and rumor-spreading women who lacked scientific knowledge. These citizen scientists were unsuccessful at gaining political traction, as they were constrained by neoliberal and traditional gender ideologies that dictated how private citizens—especially women—should act. By highlighting the challenges these citizen scientists faced, Kimura provides insights into the complicated relationship between science, foodways, gender, and politics in post-Fukushima Japan and beyond.

“A gripping, suspenseful page-turner” (Kirkus Reviews) with a “fast-paced, detailed narrative that moves like a thriller” (International Business Times), Fukushima teams two leading experts from the Union of Concerned Scientists, David Lochbaum and Edwin Lyman, with award-winning journalist Susan Q. Stranahan to give us the first definitive account of the 2011 disaster that led to the worst nuclear catastrophe since Chernobyl. Four years have passed since the day the world watched in horror as an earthquake large enough to shift the Earth's axis by several inches sent a massive tsunami toward the Japanese coast and Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, causing the reactors' safety systems to fail and explosions to reduce concrete and steel buildings to rubble. Even as the consequences of the 2011 disaster continue to exact their terrible price on the people of Japan and on the world, Fukushima addresses the grim questions at the heart of the nuclear debate: could a similar catastrophe happen again, and—most important of all—how can such a crisis be averted?

This open access book presents the findings from on-site research into radioactive cesium contamination in various agricultural systems affected by the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant accident in March 2011. This third volume in the series reports on studies undertaken at contaminated sites such as farmland, forests, and marine and freshwater environments, with a particular focus on livestock, wild plants and mushrooms, crops, and marine products in those environments. It also provides additional data collected in the subsequent years to show how the radioactivity levels in agricultural products and their growing environments have changed with time and the route by which radioactive materials entered agricultural products as well as their movement between different components (e.g., soil, water, and trees) within an environmental system (e.g., forests). The book covers various topics, including radioactivity testing of food products; decontamination trials for rice and livestock production; the state of contamination in, trees, mushrooms, and timber; the dynamics of radioactivity distribution in paddy fields and upland forests; damage incurred by the forestry and fishery industries; and the change in consumers’ attitudes. Chapter 19 introduces a real-time radioisotope imaging system, a pioneering technique to visualize the movement of cesium in soil and in plants. This is the only book to provide systematic data on the actual change of radioactivity, and as such is of great value to all researchers who wish to understand the effect of radioactive fallout on agriculture. In addition, it helps the general public to better understand the issues of radio-contamination in the environment. The project is ongoing; the research groups from the Graduate School of Agricultural and Life Sciences of The University of Tokyo continue their work in the field to further evaluate the long-term effects of the Fukushima accident.

Around the world, food has probably never been as safe as it is today. However, periodic crises have aroused consumer anxiety and contributed to a general lack of confidence in the agro-industrial system. The diverse nature of these crises increases governments’ and industry difficulties in predicting and tackling them. This book addresses the relations between risk and food theoretically and empirically through case studies from Japan and China. Part I of the book examines the interaction between theoretical aspects and decision-making. The book theorizes the links between food and risk and analyses the decision-making process in light of risks and governance. The relationship between food risks, governance systems and economic decisions is assessed to explore ideas such as the "pact of nutrition" and the theory of weak signals. Part II examines case studies from China and Japan in the aftermaths of recent crises such as the milk powder scandal in China and food safety following the Fukushima nuclear accident and tsunami in Japan. This book will be an important resource for scholars, academics and policy-makers in the fields of sociology, economics, food studies, Chinese studies and Japanese studies and theories of risks and safety.