TOKYO, April 18 — Japan’s food waste mountain exceeds the amount of global food aids, latest figures have suggested. Japan threw away an estimated 6.46 million tons of food in 2015 that could have been eaten, according to a report compiled jointly by the agriculture ministry and the environment ministry. Throwing away food means it wastes water, energy and fuel that were required to grow, store and distribute food, while discarded it ends up in landfill where it rots, releasing climate changing gases, experts say. The agriculture ministry pointed out that good progress has been made by food manufacturers to reduce food waste since the ministry started assembling detailed records … Continue reading →

TOKYO, April 18 — Strong sales of Japanese wagyu beef to the U.S. have made exporters use up tariff rate quota (TRQ) in April, triggering a 26.4 percent out-of-quota tariff rate on exports into the U.S. Japan reached its 200 metric tons of U.S. annual TRQ as of April 10, according to data released by the United States Customs and Border Protection. The volume more than doubled, compared with 70 metric tons in April a year earlier. Last year, wagyu beef exports filled the quota in June. Once Japan hit the quota limit, the U.S. tariff on Japanese beef imports will rise to a 26.4 percent tariff of the export … Continue reading →

TOKYO, April 14 — Japan’s governing Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) has heard from farm exporters requesting to remove trade restrictions related to the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster imposed on Japanese agricultural products. The LDP’s committee that deals with agricultural exports held a meeting on April 13. It brought stakeholders interested in farm exporting to the table to help the committee focus on the issues. This time, it included Sankyomeat, a subsidiary of Itoham Foods Ind., Japan’s largest wagyu exporter. During the meeting, a Sankyomeat official pointed out that Taiwan lifted bans on imports of Japanese beef last year, but the country still keeps restriction measures in place on produce from … Continue reading →

TOKYO, April 10 — Taishu Soba of Tsushima, off Nagasaki prefecture in southern Japan is among the latest three products that have been granted the nation’s geographical indications (GIs). Japan has its own GI system to guarantee the protected status of food products. It aims to help farmers to differentiate their products from competing products and build a reputation of quality that is linked to the geographical origin. Besides Taishu Soba, Matsudate Shibori Daikon in Akita prefecture and Yamagata Celery got GI registration, the agriculture ministry said on April 9. The Japanese GI system now protects 62 products from 35 regions, according to the ministry. The infringement of GI products … Continue reading →