Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF) made an announcement on July 12 that the Government of the United States of America dropped a barrier to imports of Unshu mikan (orange), also known as “satsuma orange,” produced at four prefectures such as Kumamoto and Nagasaki in Kyushu Island.
It has been banned for Japan to export to the United States Unshu oranges produced in the Kyushu region, due to outbreaks of Japanese orange fly, a kind of citrus pest infesting the fruits, at the orchards in the region.
The two governments of Japan and the United States reached an agreement on July 11 that the United States removes an embargo on imports of the Kyushu oranges on the condition that her government accepts only Unshu oranges produced at Japanese orange fly-free orchards in Kyushu’s four prefectures.
These four prefectures consist of Kumamoto, Nagasaki, Saga, and Fukuoka. The United States has been importing the Unshu oranges on a condition that they are harvested at orange fly-free orchards only in Honshu and Shikoku islands since 1967.
Since then, the United States has long prohibited imports of Kyushu oranges so as to intercepting the Japanese orange fly into her States.
At the latest bilateral talks, the two governments agreed in details on how to provide farmers’ orchards with an official certification of being free from Japanese orange fly’s outbreaks, which has enabled the four prefectures to ship their Unshu oranges to the United States.
MAFF officials are growing their expectation that the latest agreement with the United States will be a major step toward increasing exports of Japanese Unshu oranges to the States, since these four prefectures in the Kyushu region occupy some 25 percent of the total production of Unshu oranges in Japan.