日元贬值让进口商处于困境

日元贬值让进口商处于困境

日元的贬值使日本的进口商处于困境，同时，也使大型出口公司利润增加。日本政府谨慎地为日本银行创造可驾驭的经济环境。但是因为顾客的特定需求，可选择的原料商很有限，使得像奥佳华一类的公司运营得十分艰难。

测试中可能遇到的词汇和知识：

manoeuvre 调遣

Inflation 通货膨胀

Stimulus 刺激物

Swell 膨胀

Interest rate rise: Japan prospect of weaker yen leaves sour taste（361words）

By Robin Harding in Tokyo

Kinako — a sweet yellow flour used in desserts — is as quintessentially Japanese as food ingredients come,but even this niche product is not immune to economic ripples emanating from the US Federal Reserve.

Yoshio Ogawa,president of 103-year-old Ogawa Industries,makes most of his kinako using soyabeans imported from the US. The dollar exchange rate is crucial to his profitability.With the yen already trading at about Y124 to the dollar,down more than 50 per cent in the two-and-a-half years since Prime Minister Shinzo Abe came to power,importers such as Mr Ogawa can ill-afford more yen weakness.

“If we can pass the price rises on then it is fine but the question is whether consumers keep buying,” he says.

Inflation in Japan is still running close to zero,so even if the Fed does not tighten policy in September,at some point there will be a sharp divergence between US and Japanese interest rates.

Higher US rates make it relatively more attractive to hold dollars. But while a weaker yen hurts importers such as Mr Ogawa by pushing up the price of foreign foodstuffs and energy,it also swells profits at big exporters such as Toyota.

The export boost is a stimulus,encouraging Japan's manufacturers to raise production and investment at home,although big companies have been slow to accept yen weakness is here to stay.

So far the spur to Japanese growth has not been enough to drive up wages. Companies such as Ogawa Industries are left in a bind,because the prices of their inputs have risen but the incomes of their customers have not.

That has changed yen politics.Whereas yen weakness got a warm welcome in the early days of Abenomics in 2013,politicians are now much warier,creating a tricky environment for the Bank of Japan to navigate.

Mr Ogawa is doing what he can to prepare for a stronger dollar. But he points out that his room for manoeuvre is limited because customers want non-genetically modified soya. That restricts his choice of suppliers.

“One choice is to use more domestic beans,” he says,adding that Japanese produce,however,is not cheap.