Category Archives: Food & Agriculture

“Safety and security” ranked the first for two straight years among 2017 marketing keywords recommended by distributors in Japan, the Japan Agricultural News revealed on January 25 in a report on its latest survey of 2017 marketing transactions of agricultural and livestock products. A number of fruits and vegetables wholesalers particularly in the Kanto Region made a forecast that imports of farm products will increase due to unfavorable weather condition in 2017, which seems to be one of factors bringing about the result of the survey. With regard to imports of farm products, however, 58 percent of polled distributors responded to the survey by saying “planning to maintain the status … Continue reading →

Inbound tourists increased their spending for eating and drinking in Japan to 757.4 billion yen in 2016, 18 percent up over the previous year, a research made by Japan Tourism Agency revealed. A considerable increase in international tourists visiting Japan as well as a Japanese cuisine boom are favorable factors for creating a huge demand for agricultural and food products in the domestic market. According to the Tourism Agency’s latest announcement on a consumption trend survey for foreigners visiting Japan in 2016, a total amount of their consumption hit a record high of 3.7476 trillion yen. International tourists averagely spent 156 thousand yen to visit Japan in 2016. Although the … Continue reading →

Kyushu Okinawa Agricultural Research Center of the National Agriculture and Food Research Organization or NARO headquartered at Tsukuba city in Ibaraki prefecture has decided to introduce a new system to prevent unauthorized commercialization of Japanese patented strawberry varieties in foreign countries. NARO’s Research Center, based at Koshi city in Kumamoto prefecture, agreed to collaborate in implementing the system with three prefectural governments of Mie, Kagawa and Chiba, which succeeded in jointly developing a new strawberry variety named “Yotsuboshi” (literally, four stars). Under the new system of protecting strawberry breeders’ right, NARO’s Research Center and three prefectural governments will recruit a cooperative corporation in respective foreign countries. The cooperative corporation will … Continue reading →

A total amount of Japan’s exports of agricultural, forestry, fishery and food products has been on track for growth in recent years. In 2016, however, it is likely to level off. The exports of those products amounted to 669.9 billion yen in January-November 2016, only 1 billion yen or 0.1 percent up over the relevant period of 2015, the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF) announced on January 12. Sales of farm products such as rice, beef, and green tea have been continuously increasing in overseas markets. It is anticipated, however, that exports of fishery products will experience a slump during many years to come because a poor catch … Continue reading →

Institute of Fruit Tree and Tea Science of the National Agriculture and Food Research Organization or NARO, headquartered at Tsukuba city in Ibaraki prefecture, found that condensed essences of amino acid, cate-chin and caffeine, making up green tea’s taste of good flavor and bitterness, are extracted into hot water from green tea leaves produced in Japan much more than from those in China. NARO’s Institute hopes that green tea manufacturers will be able to publicize a characteristic feature of tea leaves produced in Japan with a quality of better extraction of essences in the international green tea market. The Institute has made a physical and chemistry research to find out … Continue reading →