Japan picked worst time possible to expand Wagyu beef production
Japan’s attempt to ramp up production of its Wagyu beef was badly timed, with the Covid-19 crisis hitting sales of such luxury foods hardest.
Japan aimed to meet to meet soaring tourist demand for the succulent, perfectly marbled beef, and eventually, to build an export market. Instead, the country’s cold-storage facilities are filling rapidly with the meat, which commands prices as high as $500 a kg in more prosperous times.
The Wagyu expansion plan depended on Tokyo’s 80,000 restaurants being busy, and on tourist numbers continuing at 2019’s level of more than 31m. And with the Tokyo Olympics only a year away, Japan’s agriculture ministry decided last summer to double its Wagyu beef output to 300,000 tonnes a year over the next 15 years.
But Covid-19 struck, and the Japanese government declared a state of emergency last week.
Apart from supermarkets, pharmacies, and others providing critical services, many businesses in Tokyo, Osaka and the five other prefectures for which the emergency was declared, will stay closed until May 6 in line with the government’s request for people to stay at home and limit social contact.
The Liberal Democratic Party’s Agriculture and Forestry Committee has proposed that the Japanese government issue vouchers that people can exchange for free Wagyu beef, and some other foods. Supermarkets will help, by offering Wagyu beef at a special price of 20-40% below normal rates.
But pandemic measures have devastated sales of Wagyu and of other luxury foods for which Japan is famous, such as sea urchin, crab, and tilefish.
