BY NORIFUMI TANAKA STAFF WRITER
A farmer harvests tomatoes in Katori, Chiba Prefecture, on April 13. Hong Kong has banned imports of vegetables from the prefecture. (Norifumi Tanaka)Just when they were reaping the rewards from tapping the fast-growing Asian markets, some Japanese businesses are now seeing their efforts blocked due to radiation fears.
Food exporters have not been the only ones affected by the actions taken in China and South Korea concerning radioactive fallout from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant. Medical services and tourism have also been hard hit.
On March 19, Hidefumi Ishizaka, deputy director of the Sales Department at the Hokkaido Federation of Fisheries Cooperative Associations, had to deliver some discouraging news to Zeng Bo, president of a marine product importing company in China.
"We cannot guarantee freshness (of our products). We have to suspend our exports for the time being," Ishizaka told Zeng over the phone.
Exports of fresh fish to Shanghai, which had started in December last year, were halted.
Fresh fish, including broadbanded thornyheads caught off Nemuro in eastern Hokkaido, had been airlifted to China from Shin-Chitose Airport in the suburbs of Sapporo on Wednesdays.
Much like in Tokyo, the fish were offered to customers the following night at first-class Japanese restaurants in Shanghai, Beijing and other cities.
But China strengthened its quarantine measures after the crisis erupted at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, which was crippled by the March 11 tsunami.
Now, up to an extra day is needed for the fish to pass through inspections.
Fish consumption in Japan has been decreasing due to lower birthrates and a declining popularity of the food. Prices of many fish have dropped.
But global demand for fish has increased sharply as consumers in the United States and Europe are favoring healthier food and emerging economies like China and India continue to grow.
Japanese fisheries associations have been exporting fish to stabilize prices and keep fishermen employed.
Zeng requested exports of fresh fish to meet the increasing demand among Chinese who developed a taste for the food during their trips to Japan. Wholesale prices of the fish in China are several times higher than those in Japan.
When Zeng inspected the Erimo fisheries cooperative association in Hokkaido in February, he proposed to increase imports from Japan to twice a week.
"We can sell the fish (in China) if we use the 'Hokkaido' brand," Zeng said at that time.
But now, most Japanese food is being avoided by foreign countries.
"Even if we say that Hokkaido brand products are safe, it is useless," Ishizaka said.
Produce kept under strict hygiene controls is also not immune to overseas radiation fears.
In Katori, Chiba Prefecture, people must remove their shoes before entering the highly sterile plastic greenhouses of Wagoen, an organization set up by farmers.
Cherry tomatoes with a sugar concentration twice as high as conventional tomatoes grow in the greenhouses.
Although the tomatoes have not been subject to suspended shipment orders, Hong Kong, the main customer, suspended imports of all vegetables produced in Chiba Prefecture.
Wagoen engages in added-value agricultural products, operates sales outlets and employs about 1,500 people, including part-timers.
"If we do not export our products, we will have an oversupply and their prices will decline. As a result, the employment situation of our local area cannot improve," said Hirokazu Kiuchi, a Wagoen representative.
Wagoen set up an organization in Hong Kong in 2007. Its sales stood at 1 billion yen (about $12.5 million) in 2010, up 30 percent from the previous year.
Wagoen also exports rice and other vegetables that are exempt from shipment suspensions. But these exports have dropped to half since the March 11 Great East Japan Earthquake.
One order for 18 tons of popular "koshihikari" brand rice produced in Fukushima Prefecture was also canceled.
In central Osaka city, medical corporation Seijukai runs a clinic on a basement floor in the fashionable Nanba district. But now, the Italian-made sofas in the waiting room are empty because Chinese tourists have disappeared.
In 2009, Nippon Travel Agency Co. began selling tour packages, mainly to wealthy Chinese, that included medical examinations for cancer.
The number of participants in the tours soared to 250 in 2010 from 40 in 2009. Many Chinese participants have stayed for several days in Tokyo or Hokkaido.
The tours are priced at 1 million yen on average, but some can run as high as 2 million yen. The medical examination fees are about 350,000 yen.
The number of Chinese tourists to Japan plummeted after the arrest of a Chinese fishing trawler captain who rammed Japan Coast Guard ships near the Senkaku Islands in September last year.
But the ensuing diplomatic dispute did not affect the medical tours.
"There was no impact on the tours because participants had clear purposes," said an official of Nippon Travel.
But no Chinese have taken part in the tours since the Chinese government advised its citizens to postpone visits to Japan after the March 11 disaster.
Medical tourism has spread to various countries, including South Korea and Thailand. But tourism officials expect the Chinese tourists to eventually return to Japan.
"Chinese people put their trust in Japanese medical services. Because of that, they will come to Japan again once the recommendation is lifted," said Shiro Aoki, general manager of Nippon Travel's Medical Tourism Promotion Office.
But he said if it takes as long as six months to resolve the nuclear crisis, a Chinese travel agency that sells Nippon Travel's medical tours in China could turn to other countries.
"As a result, we could be forgotten," he said.
"Screen tourism," in which travelers visit the sites of movies and TV dramas, has also been affected by the accident in Fukushima.
A South Korean TV production company in April last year asked the Tottori prefectural government about providing location sites for a TV drama.
The prefectural government invited members of the company and related people to sightseeing places in the prefecture, such as the Tottori Sand Dunes and the city of Kurayoshi, where traditional Japanese buildings and streets remain.
Governor Shinji Hirai also got involved. And the company picked the prefecture.
After the TV drama was aired in South Korea in December last year, the number of South Korean tourists to Tottori Prefecture soared.
South Korean Asiana Airlines, which has been flying between Seoul and Yonago Airport in Tottori Prefecture, started to use larger aircraft for the route in January.
The number of South Koreans who used the flight service in February nearly doubled to 1,664 compared with November last year.
In March, however, the figure plunged to 529.
Tottori Prefecture is even further away from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant than Osaka.
The Tottori prefectural government expected the economic effects from South Korean tourists to reach around 1.2 billion yen, including hotel fees and expenditures on food and drinks.
The prefecture now has to rethink its strategy.
The central government may also have to change its economic growth strategy.
"In order to achieve certain economic growth, we have to make profits from the growth of (other countries in) the world," said Masayuki Naoshima, a former trade minister and current vice chairman of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan. "But it has become difficult to do so."
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