The art of the useless is something many of us specialize in over a life time. We accquire stuff, that we may never use, drawing comfort in the act of buying.
The Japanese, with growing urbanization and wealth, post World War 2, indulged in wanton buying and coined the word 'Chindogu' for urban folk buying up and accumalating useless stuff.Stuff that was useless or that they would not use.
Now with the Japanese economy stagnating and real incomes dropping for urban Japan, many people are re looking at their habit of 'Chindogu'. It is extremely difficult to drop the habit at the flick of a switch.
Japan's rural population has aged and the farming sector has seen alarming dips in productivity with the average age of farmers, being about 65 years, prompting many youngsters to relocate from Japanes cities like Tokyo and Osaka to rural Japan and take up farming as a livelihood. For this to happen young Japanese will need to give up the habit of wandering into malls and shopping for Chindogu, which like many things is an addiction.
