2011-06-08

Tochigi Pref to donate 1 million strawberry plants to Miyagi farmers

Tochigi Prefecture, Japan's largest producer of strawberries, will donate 1 million strawberry plants to farmers in Miyagi Prefecture's Watari and Yamamoto towns. More than 90% of the 98 hectares of cultivated land in these towns were ravaged by the 11 March tsunami.

With the help of volunteers, farmers prepared land and built new greenhouses on 20 hectares of high ground and idle land. But, unable to procure more than 800,000 of the needed 1.6 million plants within Miyagi, JA Miyagi Watari branch director Kunio Iwasa led a delegation to Tochigi to obtain the remaining 800,000 plants. In response to their plea, Tochigi Governor Tomikazu Fukuda pledged to donate 1 million of Tochigi's prized "Tochiotome" strawberry plants.

Besides the good will shown by Tochigi's donation to help out a stricken neighbor, the path of the request is interesting to this American blogger. The leader of a local agricultural cooperative approached the governor of another prefecture for help. And the governor had the authority to pledge this donation. The article makes no mention of communications between Mr. Iwasa and Miyagi's governor, or between him and JA national administration, in helping prepare this request. While not mentioned, there must have been some form of preliminary groundwork to set this up with enough coordination that reporters from several newspapers were present for the meeting.

Source:
Ayako Higuchi, "1 million Tochigi "Tochiotome" plants to be provided to Miyagi farmers," Asahi Shimbun, 2011/6/8, http://mytown.asahi.com/areanews/tochigi/TKY201106070637.html (ja) (accessed 2011/6/8)

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