With the Japanese cheese market facing an imminent threat from imports due to multilateral free trade pacts, a mom and pop factory in Hokkaido is striving to offer quality products that can compete with Europe's best.
Ryota Kikuchi, who opened his cheese factory, Chikap, with his wife in late 2013, is looking to bump sales with a new 12-square-meter cheese-maturing chamber that will increase the factory's production capacity by 20 percent.
"We want to compete with European products, which are high in quality and low in price," Kikuchi, 37, says, conscious that the task promises to become more challenging once the 11-member Pacific trade pact takes effect in December and a free trade agreement between Japan and the European Union is expected to enter into force early next year.