Heavy Rain Gives Blow to Fish, Rice Farmers in Chiba Pref.

Narita, Chiba Pref., Sept. 26 (Jiji Press)--Heavy rain from Typhoon Dujuan, the 25th typhoon of the year, has caused breaches of embankments at Inbanuma, a major lake in Chiba Prefecture, which neighbors Tokyo, severely damaging fish farms and warehouses for agricultural produce.

At the Tani Fish Farm, which grows "nishikigoi" ornamental carp and goldfish in the city of Narita near Inbanuma, most of its 100,000 fish were washed away.

Kenji Tani, 58, who heads the farm, said that when he returned from an overseas business trip Tuesday morning, the entire site was flooded to a height of about 1.5 meters. He could only approach the farm by boat.

With facilities and equipment submerged, the total damage should be "about 1 billion yen," Tani said. On Friday, the water finally receded, and the staff began cleaning the muddy facilities. "To be honest, we can't see the future yet because we've just started (cleaning)," he said.

Most of about 50,000 eels cultured by the Inbanuma fisheries cooperative in Narita are believed to have died or been swept away, resulting in a loss of hundreds of millions of yen. The disaster left large refrigerators overturned.

[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]