The Taiwan rice exportation has entered a new stage. Under the assistance of the Council of Agriculture, Japan’s Yoshio Nakajima and the Taiwan Lotus Rice Factory has established a production and marketing joint venture called "Japan Grown, Taiwan Made, Globally Sold." For the year 2006, 52 hectares of farmland have successfully produced the "Dream Beauty" rice variety. Of the harvested amount, 144 metric tons have already been transported by YANG MING Marine Transport Corporation on July 19th to Osaka, Japan. By the end of July, 3 kilogram and 5 kilogram packs will be sold to Japanese homes through the Guan Xi area rice stores.

The Council of Agricultural said that since Japan started implementing its new food safety regulations on 29th of May, 528 items of needs to be tested for imported rice. That batch was produced in a special production area that under the strict guidance of the Agriculture and Food Agency and the Tainan District Agricultural Research and Extension Station as to the amount of pesticide and fertilizer used during its production. The effective field management used on this batch has enabled it to pass Japan’s inspection in the early part of July.

The Council of Agricultural also said that since Japanese consumers still prefer to purchase rice produced in Japan. Until today, countries that sell their rice to Japan only manage to sell to business establishments. But in the past two years, Taiwan rice sold in Japan have entered the consumer market successfully.

The Council of Agriculture said that when the chairman of Yoshio Nakajima visited Taiwan in mid-June, he announced that their store had organized a "Dream Beauty" Taiwan rice trade fair to promote this Taiwan rice variety. By June 15th, they had enlisted more than 50 retail rice stores. Moreover, the store’s activities that initially drew 10,000 people to buy "Dream Beauty" have already reached more than 4,000 consumers. By the end of the activities, the selling price including delivery fees was 2,900 yen for a 5 kilogram pack, one of the highest prices in the Japanese rice market.

The Council of Agriculture said that "Dream Beauty" is high quality and contracted farmers were very willing to participate in its production. Yoshio Nakajima also said that the contracted production area will increase from 52 hectares this year to 100 hectares next year. In order to expand the scale of selling Taiwanese rice to Japan next year, the COA will add in Pingtung (Gaoshu) and Kaohsiung (Meinong) to the producing areas.

The Council said that the international production and marketing joint venture has had a successful beginning and will continue expanding rice exports to Japan, hoping that it helps enhance the growth of Taiwan’s rice industry.