May 29 marks one year since a volcano called Shindake erupted at Japan’s southern island of Kuchinoerabu-jima, part of Kagoshima prefecture on the island of Kyushu. Last December, 108 residents of the island, 80 percent of the total residents before the eruption, who had been evacuated mostly to the neighboring island of Yaku-shima, returned to their home island since the evacuation instruction was lifted except for 8 families living near the crater. Some of the people, who came back to the Kuchinoerabu-jima island, began to grow sweet potatoes, raw materials for producing a distilled spirit called “Shochu,” so as to revitalize the economy in the disaster-hit island. Meanwhile, they are … Continue reading →

“Yubari Melons” produced in Yubari-shi, Hokkaido, well-known high-grade brand melons, were put up for a season-opening auction at the Sapporo City Central Wholesale Market on May 26. A package of two pieces of A-Grad Yubari Melon marked a record-high price of 3 million yen, breaking the previous record of 2.5 million yen. Yubari Melon was just registered under the Geographical Indication (GI) Protection System last year. The GI Protection System, administrated by the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF), aims to guarantee high qualities of products which have unique values of specific regions. People of the Yubari-shi Agricultural Cooperative (JA) appreciated that MAFF’s GI System had given a push … Continue reading →

At a review meeting of “2016 Mother’s Day sales battle” held in Tokyo on May 24 by Flowering Japan Council (FJC), based at Chuo-ku, Tokyo, a number of FJC’s members, owners of flower shops, raised their expectations that flowers of potted hydrangeas, European hydrangeas, will be “standard goods” on the Mother’s Day of Japan in a near future. According to the reports presented by the participating owners of flower shops, who are main members of FJC, sales of hydrangeas followed carnations on Mother’s Day this year. Some of the flower shops plan to purchase more hydrangeas from the market for the 2017 Mother’s Day. FJC organized the meeting for providing … Continue reading →