The young rice plants are still growing well.

As the rice plants develop, the weeds grow, too. The battle against the weeds now begins. In the old days, weeding was very difficult, as we had to crawl around the paddy fields on all-fours and pull the weeds by hand; now we have herbicides to do the work for us. However, if the herbicides are overused, the excess chemicals can cause problems, so the producers of these products are constantly trying to develop herbicides that do the job with a lower concentration of chemicals.

Ancient agricultural methods existed that did not require the use of herbicides: weeding by hand; pushing a weeder through the fields; or even the use of domesticated ducks to eat the weeds.

The paddy fields now appear to be a single blanket of green; if you were to see them from an airplane, they would probably look like a golf course.

Anytime soon, firefly season will begin here in the Tohoku region.

Yonekawa is known as the "Nagasaki of the Tohoku Region" due to the martyring of Christians that took place here. Many turned out for its 25th Christian Festival, which was held in remembrance on the site of the martyring of 120 people, keeping the area bustling all day long.

With the availability of tours for Christians, many believers made their way here and offered their devout prayers at open-air masses in unison with the many others present.

This year I went to visit Goto City in Nagasaki Prefecture and spoke with the mayor about Kakure Krishitans. Japan's very first church is located in the Goto Islands, which are part of Nagasaki Prefecture. It feels to me as if Nagasaki and Tome City are in a sense linked on a road that leads to Rome. Tsunaki also has a Christian Festival and as its executive committee thinks of a new plan for the festival every year, it has become an event that tourists love and can be enjoyed by both young and old.

Many people now visit Tome City for its Christian Festival, and the links between those people, plus the further increase of those links, is important. The special products on sale, the enjoyment of the local fishing, the folk entertainments on stage, and being blessed with good weather have led to fun event which is vitalizing the region.

"Kakure Krishitan" is Japanese for "Hidden Christian": a modern term for a member of the Japanese Roman Catholic Church that went underground in the 1630s.

There is at present a rice surplus in Japan. About 35% of rice paddies are not being used under the "rice acreage reduction policy". The farms of Tome City too, an area which grows delicious rice, are cooperating with the national rice acreage reduction policy.

The unused paddies are going to ruin. What you see in front of you are the weeds growing in the fields this year. Last year's weeds have become hard and woody.

The rice acreage reduction policy is a national agricultural policy designed to cut the production of rice in Japan. This is achieved by making rice cropping farmers reduce the acreage of rice under cultivation.

Although the rice plants are growing well, due to this year's abnormal weather conditions their growth seems to be somewhat delayed.

Recently, what with the temperature reaching highs of 27°C or 28°C and then the sudden 15°C low-temperature weather warnings, farm water management has been very difficult.