Record snowfall in January has severely damaged apple orchards in the northeastern Japan prefecture of Aomori, the country's largest apple-producing region, with authorities fearing losses could exceed 10 billion yen.
Among many areas that saw above-average snowfall in January, the city of Hirosaki reported a record 126-centimeter accumulation, according to a local meteorological observatory.
The weight of snow has badly damaged apple trees grown in the city and 10 other municipalities, with more snow expected this month, raising concerns about the impact on this year's autumn harvest in the prefecture, which produces about 60 percent of Japan's apples.
Yoshimoto Kudo, 85, who cultivates around 150 trees at his 4,000-square-meter orchard, said many branches were broken, and the trunks of some trees as old as 50 to 60 years even snapped.
Kudo has been working to reduce damage by spreading snow-melting agents and reinforcing branches, but uncleared farm roads have left three of his five orchards inaccessible.
"I won't know the full extent of the damage until the snow melts, but I estimate that about a quarter of my trees have been affected," he said.
To deal with the snow, the Aomori prefectural government has allocated a supplementary budget to fund aerial distribution of snow-melting agents using unmanned helicopters.
Officials said an assessment of the full damage will be conducted after the weather warms but warned that further snowfall in February could worsen the situation.
© KYODO
15 Comments
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Yubaru
And now we all can expect, already "expensive" apples to go up even more. I really have a hard time paying 400 yen or more, for just one apple.
tamanegi
The quality of apples here hasn't been great the last few years here. Hope the farmers recover.
Aly Rustom
Beat me to it bro.
Speed
This is just another way for the government to say that apple prices are going to up even more. I already pay just under 200 yen for one apple.
kohakuebisu
Aomori is used to snow, so this is exceptional. That's if its not obvious from the guy saying "we've lost fifty year old trees".
We're in Nagano and our garden has been very heavily damaged. We've lost tree that were over fifteen years old and eight or nine meters high. You can't tie up something that big.
ifd66
more chemicals in the system
kurisupisu
Those chemicals will leech into the ground and then into the apples..
YeahRight
Just another excuse to keep on raising prices.
Tell_me_bout_it
Apples are not worth it anymore. You can rarely find 200 yen a piece.
kohakuebisu
fwiw, I think Aomori is home to one of Japan's most famous organic farmers, the guy that wrote the "kiseki no ringo" book, an occhan with a very photogenic big gap-toothed smile. I think he started doing the usual spray your apples 10 times in a full Hazmat suit thing (i.e., standard Japanese apple production) but gave up when his wife had a reaction to the pesticides. He covered his orchard floor with organic mulch and found that he could still get trees to thrive
I can't remember the guy's name, but I hope his trees are okay..
virusrex
What chemicals are these that you worry so much about them? There are harmless, non-reactive agents that are used for this purpose and would not affect the apples, powdered shells or charcoal-based, it should be natural to think this is the kind that is used in cases like this.
grc
I await the story about apples being stolen (‘scrumped’) from orchards
quercetum
Kimura Akinori is from HIrosaki, Aomori.
奇跡のリンゴ―「絶対不可能」を覆した農家 木村秋則の記録 (幻冬舎文庫)
Dango bong
great, more excuses for Japanese companies to rip off consumers and artificially inflate prices even more....
blue in green
85 and still working that hard...
He must eat an apple a day!
quercetum
The New Zealand varieties - Jazz, Royal Gala - are excellent and widely available in Tokyo.
Dango bong
Japan you could import to help the consumers and keep prices down. But no, you want to charge your consumers to be a protectionist economy.