There is generally little rice remaining from last years crop as noted above by Freecia. Seems that the folks at the Agriculture ministry have decided to mix rice again , which causes panic buying from a subset of the general population. Very few on here would remember the debacle from 90's. Also , and despite the price , the higher quality rice has been sold off. What remains is lower quality which is often used for sembei etc. which they are now mixing. Don't worry though , the rice situation will right itself in October or so.