The strongest support for mothers raising babies is a baby food. The producer of the first made-in-Japan baby food was also Wakodo, in 1937.

Early childhood mortality was then still very high at 106.8 deaths for every 1000 live births. Although it was lower than the 150 - 160 deaths for every 1000 live births at the time of the founding of Wakodo, it was still considerably higher than those in Western countries.

Causes of those deaths were, in addition to pneumonia and other diseases, malnutrition, indigestion, and bacterial GI disorders. That reality made it even more urgent to provide the babies with food that was highly nutritious as well as hygienic. The first made-in-Japan baby food, alpha processed rice gruel product, “Grismael,” was born to resolve this problem.

Incidentally, across the Pacific, the United States had its first baby food product in 1928, 10 years ahead of Japan. It was born out of the idea of a cannery manager, Mr. Daniel F. Gerber. It was said that Gerber had the idea when seeing his wife busying herself in preparing their baby’s solid food, despite being late to get ready for a party they had been invited to.

In short, American baby food was born as a means to make mothers’ lives easy, which is quite different from the story in Japan, in that our baby food was born out of the nutritional necessity for children.

By the way, Gerber’s first baby food lineup was said to be five types of cans, peas, plums, carrots, strained spinach, and beef vegetable soup.