Tag - food

 
 

FOOD

Cindy McCain, the executive director of the U.N. World Food Programme, speaks during an interview in Yokohama on Wednesday.
JAPAN
Aug 21, 2025
WFP chief wants world to pay attention to Africa
The continent, whose countries suffer from famine, refugee and other humanitarian crises, is sometimes forgotten, Cindy McCain, the executive director of the U.N. body, says.
Kazuhiro Nomura, president of BK Japan Holdings, which operates Burger King in Japan
BUSINESS / Companies
Aug 21, 2025
Big burgers and bigger ambitions for Japan's Burger King
The fast-food chain has grown fourfold in just six years.
McDonald's Japan has canceled its plan to bundle "One Piece" trading cards with its Happy Set meals, after a similar Pokemon-themed campaign sparked a frenzy and uproar over uneaten food being discarded.
BUSINESS / Companies
Aug 21, 2025
McDonald's Japan to skip 'One Piece' Happy Meal promo
The cancellation follows a similar Pokemon-themed campaign that sparked a frenzy and uproar over uneaten food being discarded.
Rice retailed for an average ¥3,737 per 5-kilogram bag at about 1,000 supermarkets nationwide from Aug. 4 to 10, up ¥195 from the previous week and around 1.4 times the value a year earlier, according to the agriculture ministry.
JAPAN / Society
Aug 19, 2025
Rice prices climbed in early August as stockpile release slowed, data shows
Retail prices averaged ¥3,737 per 5-kilogram bag from Aug. 4 to 10, up ¥195 from the previous week and around 1.4 times the price a year earlier.
Beijing imposed a ban on imports of Japanese fisheries products in August 2023.
JAPAN
Aug 18, 2025
JETRO struggles to expand scallop supply chain in U.S.
Steep tariffs imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump left prospects for the project uncertain, apparently making businesses reluctant to invest in it.
Actors in period costume pose on a re-creation of a Tudor wine fountain at Hampton Court Palace in Surrey, England, in April 2010. England’s recent wine boom is hitting limits due to scale, costs and competition.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 18, 2025
England’s sparkling wine is losing its fizz
It really doesn’t help having higher taxes now measured on alcohol content. The going is only getting tougher for fledgling startups.
People flee from a village after renewed fighting between Myanmar's military and an ethnic minority armed group, in Pauktaw Township in western Rakhine State in November 2023.
ASIA PACIFIC
Aug 15, 2025
Desperate Myanmar villagers scavenge for food as hunger bites
As the military fights an ethnic armed group, it has blockaded Rakhine State — throttling supplies to its estimated population of 2.5 million.
A notice is displayed at a McDonald's restaurant informing customers of the end of the Pokemon card promotion, on Tuesday in Tokyo's Toshima Ward.
BUSINESS / Companies
Aug 12, 2025
McDonald’s Japan apologizes over frenzy linked to Pokemon card promotion
Many customers bought Happy Meals in bulk to get their hands on limited-edition Pokemon trading cards, only to discard the food and resell the cards online.
Recent heat waves and little rain may impact the rice harvest in Japan that typically starts in late summer, at a time when rice supplies have already been strained by adverse weather in recent years.
JAPAN
Aug 8, 2025
Japan’s rice crop at risk as farms face record-breaking heat
Weather extremes may impact the harvest that typically starts in late summer, at a time when rice supplies have already been strained by adverse weather in recent years.
Top officials from the Farm Ministry bow deeply to apologize for mistakenly saying that Japan has enough rice based on faulty data at a meeting on Aug. 8 at LDP headquarters.
JAPAN / Politics
Aug 8, 2025
Farm ministry apologizes over erroneous rice supply and demand forecasts
The errors came to light when Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba admitted that the government’s miscalculations had led to prices surging in the past year.
The rise in household consumption spending in Japan in June was driven by a 30.1% jump in spending to buy automobiles and motorcycles, and higher electricity bills.
BUSINESS / Economy
Aug 8, 2025
Japan's household spending rises 1.3% in June
The average spending by households with two or more members was ¥295,419 ($2,000).
A rice farm in Niigata Prefecture. Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba said Tuesday that the government will reconsider its long-standing policy of limiting rice production — a measure that has been in place since around 1969 in response to chronic oversupply.
JAPAN
Aug 6, 2025
Ishiba to reverse rice curb policy as government admits to miscalculating demand
“We had assumed that production volume was adequate, despite the lack of sufficient analysis,” Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba said.
Japan's exports of food and farm produce between January and June were the highest on record for 19 items, including green tea.
BUSINESS
Aug 4, 2025
Japan food exports expand 15.5% in January to June
Exports to the U.S. hit a record first-half high of ¥141.0 billion, up 22.0% and driven by robust demand for scallops, green tea and yellowtail.
Bags of newly harvested Koshihikari brand rice are sold at a supermarket in Tokyo on Friday.
JAPAN
Aug 1, 2025
Japan's first rice crop of 2025 goes on sale at high prices
Rice prices may remain high even after autumn, leading consumers to struggle with their food spending.
Nemah Hamouda holds a baby bottle while cradling her 3-month-old granddaughter, Muntaha, as she prepares to feed her amid a severe shortage of infant formula and rising malnutrition, in Gaza City, on Tuesday.
WORLD
Aug 1, 2025
'If the baby could speak, she would scream': the risky measures to feed small babies in Gaza
Infant formula is scarce after a plummet in aid access to Gaza and many women cannot breastfeed due to malnourishment.
The price increases in August will be especially noticeable for dairy products, including milk and yogurt, according to the research firm Teikoku Databank.
BUSINESS / Economy
Jul 31, 2025
1,010 food and beverage prices to rise in Japan in August
The price increases in August will be especially noticeable for dairy products, including milk and yogurt.
Hideyuki Okamoto, ice pop maker Akagi Nyugyo's marketing team leader, says the public is more accepting of price hikes as he holds the company's flagship Garigari-kun ice pop.
BUSINESS / Economy / ANALYSIS
Jul 29, 2025
Enough apologies: How Japan is shaking off its price hike phobia
A shift in consumer mindset about such increases is driven by the biggest pay hikes in three decades and has given companies more confidence to pass on rising costs.
Prolonged high prices for food and other goods have pushed down consumer sentiment and real wages, according to the Annual Report on the Japanese Economy and Public Finance for fiscal 2025.
BUSINESS / Economy
Jul 29, 2025
Japan should take all possible measures to raise wages, white paper says
Prolonged high prices for food and other goods have pushed down consumer sentiment and real wages, while predictions for continued price climbs have curbed consumption.
At Meiji the Sutenai ("Don't throw things away") Factory in the city of Saitama, the company sells dairy products whose best-before dates are approaching.
JAPAN
Jul 29, 2025
From power generation to discounts, companies in Japan work to reduce food waste
Meiji, for example, has a store in the city of Saitama that sells dairy products whose best-before dates are approaching at about 40% off the suggested retail prices.
Palestinians, mostly children, attempt to receive a hot meal at a charity kitchen in the Mawasi area of Khan Yunis, in the southern Gaza Strip, on Tuesday.
WORLD / Society
Jul 23, 2025
More than 100 aid groups warn of 'mass starvation' spreading across Gaza
Israel is facing mounting international pressure over the catastrophic humanitarian situation in the Palestinian territory.

Longform

Members of the nonprofit group Japan Youth Memorial Association search for the remains of dead soldiers in a cave in Okinawa Prefecture in February.
The long search for Japan’s lost soldiers