GIFU, June 2 — The city of Kakamigahara in Gifu Prefecture conducts double cropping of carrots — harvesting the vegetable in spring and winter — which is rare in Japan.
The spring and summer harvesting of Kakamigahara carrots — known for their bright orange color and less pronounced smell, making them easier for children to eat — is reaching its peak in May and June, and shipments to markets in the Tokai and Hokuriku regions continue.
“Soil is the most crucial factor in cultivating high-quality carrots,” said Yoshio Yamada, 51, who grows carrots by 5-row planting on a 1.3-hectare field.
“To soften our soil, we spend a lot of time green manuring and enriching the soil,” he said, referring to the practice of growing plants and plowing them into the soil while still green in order to improve soil fertility.
His father operates Carrovester, a carrot harvesting machine, to harvest carrots one row at a time. Yamada and his mother place them in containers while eliminating those that don’t meet quality standards such as pest-damaged ones.
Then they go back and forth to load the heavy containers, each weighing around 20 kilograms when full, onto a truck.
They worked in silence, as if they are athletes going through a training routine, and shipped 72 containers to a vegetable grading and packing facility twice that day.
Kakamigahara carrots are cultivated at 44 farms belonging to a group of carrot growers in the city. In the spring and summer season of 2024, they harvested some 2,000 tons — worth about 420 million yen — on land totaling roughly 50 hectares.
In the autumn and winter season last year, they cultivated on land totaling some 30 hectares and harvested around 260 tons, worth 48 million yen.
Farmers in the city, which borders Aichi Prefecture by Kiso River, have been growing carrots since the late Meiji Period in the early 1900s, mainly in the Unuma region where fertile black volcanic soil known as andosol is accumulated.
The stable weather with small temperature differences and soft and well-draining soil make the area best fit for carrot cultivation.
Half of the carrot growers in the area cultivate the vegetable twice a year, sowing the seeds again in summer to supply carrots at high prices in November when shipments are low nationwide.
Tsuyoshi Asano, 28, an agriculture business instructor at JA Gifu, a local agricultural cooperative, negotiates prices with buyers to ensure farmer sustainability.
“The group includes farmers in their 30s to 50s who can expand cultivation area,” Asano said. “We, as a farm coop, hope to work together with the farmers to further promote Kakamigahara carrots.”