This season marks the 10th year since the nationally popular Amaou brand of strawberries first went on sale. The berries have become a symbol of Fukuoka, and the prefectural government hopes to expand sales throughout Japan and overseas given the recent announcement that Japan would join talks about the TPP. Amaou have a reputation as a premier strawberry. In early March, the local wholesale price of the berries was ¥1,280 / kg, and the price in Tokyo can sometimes exceed ¥1,500. The berries first debuted in 2002 and quickly gained attention for being 25% bigger than the Toyonoka, the main brand at that time. Over the course of three years, nearly all of the roughly 2,200 Toyonoka strawberry farmers switched to producing Amaou amid stepped up publicity by the prefectural government and JA. Of the 12,200 tons of Amaou produced in 2011, only 64 tons were exported, but the prefecture hopes to expand sales channels overseas amid recent trends toward trade liberalization. A prefecture official asserts that there will be “almost no impact” on Amaou sales even if Japan joins the TPP and the 6% import tariff on strawberries is lifted. The popular berry also faces some tough issues. The number of berry farmers has fallen by about 500 over the past 10 years due to the aging, and there have been several cases of copy-cat berries both in Japan and overseas. The prefecture had pledged to “beef up surveillance to protect Fukuoka’s intellectual property”. Source: Nishinippon Shimbun, Mar. 25 Official HP: http://www.hakata-amaou.com/index.html
