Japan’s Olive Harvest Gets Underway Amid Typhoon Season

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Flooding, land­slides, and heavy rain­fall are among the chal­lenges fac­ing Japanese olive farm­ers as the first cool days of autumn took place in the coun­try’s north­ern regions.

Further down the East Asian arch­i­pel­ago, the weather is also chang­ing, with winds becom­ing stronger and clouds darker as the olive har­vest gets under­way in cen­tral and south­ern regions of the coun­try.

“We look out for pos­si­ble typhoons and extreme phe­nom­ena which typ­i­cally occur dur­ing the har­vest­ing weeks,” Tatsuya Okumura, man­ag­ing direc­tor of Crea Farm, told Olive Oil Times.

His com­pany, located in cen­tral Japan’s Shizuoka Prefecture, pro­duces some of the most renowned Japanese extra vir­gin olive oils, two of which were awarded at the 2021 NYIOOC World Olive Oil Competition.

“Up to now, we did not expe­ri­ence heavy weather events, so we are quite excited for our new har­vest­ing sea­son,” Okumura said.

Given the rainy sum­mer, grow­ers at Crea Farm have been exam­in­ing their trees to find any sign of pathogen or pests. ​“We found a very good sit­u­a­tion,” he said.

Like other pro­duc­ers in cen­tral Japan, Okumura esti­mates that this year’s olive oil yield will be com­pa­ra­ble to the last sea­son. According to data from Juan Vilar Strategic Consultants, Japan pro­duced about 30 tons of olive oil in the 2020/21 crop year.

“We do not expect sig­nif­i­cantly larger vol­umes in the future since our trees are cur­rently full of fruits,” he added.

The har­vest­ing sea­son is also start­ing on Shodoshima, an island off the coast of south-cen­tral Japan known for its unique cli­mate, which closely resem­bles Mediterranean weather.

Some of the country’s best extra vir­gin olive oil is pro­duced on the island. However, pro­duc­ers said that this year’s har­vest has been affected by severe weather events since early spring.

“The rainy sea­son began just before flow­er­ing, and as we exam­ined the fruit set, which looked affected by the rain, we felt it not to be good as usual,” Nobuyuki Hiraiwa, pres­i­dent of Agri Olive Shodoshima, told Olive Oil Times.

Hiraiwa, another NYIOOC win­ner, empha­sized how heavy and fre­quent rain­fall inun­dated his groves in August and September.

“We did not have to face extreme events, but due to the high vol­umes of rain­fall dur­ing the sum­mer, we are on the look­out for poten­tial large out­breaks of pathogens and pests in the future,” Hiraiwa said.

He explained that ​“fruits seem to be ripen­ing ear­lier, which does not rep­re­sent a prob­lem for the over­all qual­ity since our olives are har­vested accord­ing to their ripeness. Still, olive oil yields might be slightly reduced this year.”

Hiraiwa thinks that cli­mate change may be affect­ing the weather on the island, forc­ing him to begin har­vest­ing ear­lier and ear­lier each year.

“Maybe it is global warm­ing affect­ing the weather, but it really seems as if the har­vest­ing sea­son gets ear­lier every year,” he said, adding how some cul­ti­vars are specif­i­cally affected by the cli­matic changes.

“We have to pro­ceed with Lucca har­vest ear­lier, and it seems it is now time to review our har­vest­ing sched­ule and press­ing processes accord­ingly,” Hiraiwa said.

Rain has helped the olive trees of the Ushimado Olive Garden, a com­pany in cen­tral-south­ern Japan that has earned var­i­ous acco­lades at the NYIOOC.

“Yes, we also had to face the effect of typhoons and heavy rain­fall. But in the end, those brought more water in August, which is typ­i­cally dry, so that is good for over­all fruit vol­umes,” said Hiroshi Kurihara, the tech­ni­cal direc­tor at Ushimado.

Farmers at Ushimado have just started har­vest­ing the many old and large olive trees that were planted on the island in the 1940s, to which many oth­ers have been added over time, Kurihara added.

The farms’ pro­jec­tions are for vol­umes com­pa­ra­ble to those of the pre­vi­ous sea­son. Regarding qual­ity, the com­pany expects top results.

“On September 22, we began con­duct­ing a few tests of our new olive oil,” he said. ​“It has a very round bou­quet, even if clearly bit­ter and pun­gent, the per­fect basis for our Ushimado and Ushimado Superior extra vir­gin olive oils.