Author Archives: The Japan Agricultural News

Japan’s agricultural cooperative organizations sign deal on business tie-up with convenience store chain FamilyMart

TOKYO, March 17 – The National Federation of Agriculture Cooperative Associations (JA ZEN-NOH), the marketing arm of Japan’s agricultural cooperative (JA) group, and Norinchukin Bank, the group’s financial arm, announced on March 16 that they have signed a business tie-up deal with Itochu Corporation and FamilyMart Co., Ltd. on sales and product development of farm produce. They will cooperate on boosting sales of homegrown agricultural products at FamilyMart convenience stores. They are also planning to make FamilyMart’s cashless payment app FamiPay usable at the JA group’s facilities including farmer’s stores. JA ZEN-NOH and Norinchukin Bank acquired FamilyMart’s stocks worth 57 billion yen — 10 billion yen by JA ZEN-NOH and … Continue reading

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Agricultural production value declines two years in a row reflecting drop in vegetable prices

TOKYO, March 13 – Japan’s gross agricultural production totaled 8.8938 trillion yen in 2019, down 1.8 percent from a year before, posting a year-on-year decline for two consecutive years, the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries announced on March 12. The value of production decreased below 9 trillion yen for the first time since 2015. The ministry attributes the decline to the drop in prices of vegetables due to abundant harvest. By prefecture, the production value was lower than the previous year in 36 prefectures, three-quarters of the total. Reflecting the decline in production value, farmers’ income declined 4.8 percent from a year before to 3.3215 trillion yen, posting a … Continue reading

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Japan’s soy milk production hit record high in 2020, reflecting household consumption growth

TOKYO, Feb. 16 – Soy milk production from January to December 2020 in Japan was record-high 430,534 kiloliters, according to the survey of Japan Soymilk Association. The use of plain soy milk for home-cooked dishes is expanding. However, the production growth slowed down in the October-December period as the number of convenience store shoppers dropped primarily in business districts due to the Covid-19 outbreak. The production volume of soy milk products in 2020 grew 5.3% year-over-year to 430,534 kiloliters. “People today use soy milk quite regularly for cooking hot pots and other dishes and for coffee,” according to the association.

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JA Nansun, Shizuoka, collaborates with “Love Live!” popular local anime to boost online sales of petit vert

SHIZUOKA, Feb. 26 – A local agricultural cooperative in Shizuoka Prefecture (JA Nansun) sold a set of petit vert and an original postcard in collaboration with a TV anime “Love Live! Sunshine !!” whose story is set in Numazu City. The exclusive version of boxed petit vert was available on an online shopping site, “JA Town,” for four days from February 24. That was the first shot of the initiative to support local farmers having difficulty selling products due to the Covid-19 pandemic and started with the cooperation of Sunrise Inc., a Japanese animation studio. Some other plans are to follow to support the sale of other agricultural products, as … Continue reading

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NohTube channel welcomes new members and winning popularity by showing real farmers’ lives

TOKYO, Feb. 16 – A YouTube channel of the Youth Group of the Japan Agricultural Cooperatives (JA Group) welcomed six new members. The NohTube channel, it’s called, is now run by 12 “NohTubers” and posts four videos per month instead of two in 2020. (Noh means farming in Japanese.) As of February 15, 2021, it has 33 movies, some receiving more than 40,000 views. “The more efforts we make, the more we gain. That’s a good part of being a farmer, a cattle grower, and a domestic animal inseminator,” a 45-year-old NohTuber, Iki Fujiyama, said in one of his videos. Fujiyama is a domestic animal inseminator and cattle grower in … Continue reading

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