Sagging sake market pushes producers to seek sales abroad
Ozawa Shuzo brewery hums with activity as boxed bottles of sake are loaded onto trucks. But with the domestic market shrinking, more and more of it is bound for burgeoning overseas markets where the centuries old drink is all the rage.
The small establishment has recently drawn interest from potential new customers in Thailand, Vietnam and South Korea, on top of a coterie of existing ones in the United States, France and Singapore.
Sake, a fermented drink made of rice, has hit hard times in its homeland amid changing tastes, but manufacturers are welcoming growing popularity overseas.
A steady flow of tourists visiting Ozawa Shuzo could be a sign of things to come.
“We cannot easily go abroad to explain what sake is all about, so by doing this (tours) at our brewery I hope visitors will get a better understanding of its value,” said Junichiro Ozawa, president of the 300year-old Ozawa Shuzo, at his brewery on Tokyo’s mountainous western fringe.
Underlining sake’s increasing global renown, the influential guide Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate this month issued ratings for the beverage.
Sake exports have doubled in the past decade to some 18,180 kiloliters, according to Japanese government figures, with the United States the largest single foreign market, accounting for about onequarter of the total.
Impressive growth, but that is just three percent of total shipments, suggesting plenty of room for further expansion abroad.
Major export destinations are the US, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Chinese Mainland and South Korea, according to the agriculture ministry, making up 70 percent of the total.
Shipments to fastest-growing market, the Chinese Mainland, shot up more than threefold between 2008 and last year, while they more than doubled to South Korea during that time.
In Hong Kong, where Japanese food and culture are popular, sake has been appearing on more and more restaurant menus in recent years.
“Compared to when I first started out in the business, people have increasingly become more interested in appreciating and learning more about sake,” said Stephen Tse, who manages a Japanese restaurant in Tai Hang, an upscale neighborhood in the southern Chinese city.
Authorities have actively pushed sake overseas, part of a “Cool Japan” strategy aimed at highlighting the country’s soft power,alongwithmangacomic books and Japanese food.
“Exports are increasing thanks largely to the soaring popularity of Japanese cuisine overseas,” said an official familiar with the sake industry at the National Tax Agency.
Government data show some 89,000 Japanese restaurants existed outside Japan as of July 2015, up sharply from 55,000 just two years before.