International players also competed (in Mitane-cho, Akita Prefecture)
Junsai sprout, the edible emerald
Farmers and towners of Mitane-cho, Akita Prefecture, hold the world championship of junsai picking every summer. The town is Japan’s largest producer of junsai, a delicate, slimy vegetable known as water shield in English, and the championship is held to make junsai more popular and give a boost to the junsai production.
Junsai is a wild aquatic plant that grows in water of one to three meters deep. People eat its sprout which grows in water and is covered with a transparent, viscous jelly. Its growing area totals 69 hectares nationwide and 33 hectares or almost 50% of it is in Mitane-cho.
Expert explaining how to handpick junsai
This year’s 3rd annual championship was held on July 3rd, attended by 76 contestants including some international players. Participants got on a small farmer’s boat and tried to handpick the small slimy sprout as much as possible in one hour, slowly controlling the boat using a wooden pole.
The contestants were offered special junsai dishes such as cold ramen noodles with a junsai topping after the contest. A 30-year-old US researcher of Tohoku University who currently lives in Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture, said, “Junsai goes well with everything. I think people from other countries will also like it if it’s served with pasta.”
The aquatic plant has a long history of cultivation and appears in Manyoshu, the oldest existing collection of Japanese poetry compiled during the Nara period. The town with very clear water has remained as the producer of junsai.
Contestants enjoyed special junsai dishes after the contest
Mitane-cho aims to be bigger again by using junsai as the pillar of the town development. A promotional poster created in 2012 by the commerce and industry association of the town called junsai edible emerald.