Japan Apple Market Is Something of a Lemon

It turns out Washington state’s 24-year battle to get its apples into Japan was the easy part. Now farmers are trying to find a way to get Japanese consumers to buy the fruit.

About 803 tons of American apples passed through customs from December to March, down from 8,497 tons the previous season, according to figures from Japan’s Finance Ministry.

“The thing that surprised us was the seasonal mentality there in Japan,” said Jim Thomas, spokesman for the Washington Apple Commission, a grower-supported marketing organization.

“In the United States, we’re used to buying apples year-round. In Japan, they have a season for everything--strawberry season, then watermelon season,” Thomas said.

“What we didn’t realize was that a lot of marketers in Japan were thinking of us as just one of those windows and had set aside six to eight weeks and then planned to move on.”

But hope springs eternal in the apple business.

“We’re certainly not giving up on the market,” said Tom Mathison, president of Stemilt Growers Inc. in Wenatchee. “We expect to keep a presence there and we expect it will take a number of years.”

One of the key issues being negotiated with Japanese trade officials is a restriction that allows Washington growers to ship only Red Delicious and Golden Delicious apples, said Kraig Naaszof the Northwest Horticultural Council.

“Despite all the hoopla that greeted the opening of this market initially, Japan is still the most restrictive market to which we in this industry attempt to ship apples,” Naasz said.

Price is another obstacle, Thomas said.

Washington state marketers had hoped to promote their product as a low-priced lunch-box staple--in contrast to expensive Japanese apples, customarily enjoyed after dinner as a dessert.

Japanese apple growers, who produce about 1 million tons of apples a year, traditionally work small family-run plots. Often each fruit is individually groomed and wrapped on the tree to ensure a large gourmet apple with even color, high sugar content and high price--typically $6.

When the Japanese market was hit with cheaper U.S. imports, growers there met the competition, setting bargain prices for lower quality apples--about the same quality as seen in American grocery stores--that normally would have been destined for apple juice. Japan’s gourmet apples, meanwhile, still sell at premium prices.