Japan PM Contender Koizumi Plays Down Criticism Over Licensing of Premium Grapes

Shinjiro Koizumi, Japan’s agriculture minister and a leading contender to become the country’s next prime minister, on Friday sought to defuse criticism of his ministry over a licensing deal involving a prized grape variety, after growers lodged formal protests.

A day earlier, the governor of Yamanashi Prefecture—one of the main producers of Shine Muscat grapes—publicly criticized the ministry for opening discussions with New Zealand on cultivating the fruit abroad without consulting growers.

Governor Kotaro Nagasaki, joined by a representative of the local agricultural cooperative, met Koizumi to file a complaint and urged the government to expand export markets rather than grant licenses for overseas production.

Koizumi, who faces a key leadership vote next week within the ruling Liberal Democratic Party to succeed Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, said the ministry had no intention of approving cultivation licenses without first consulting producers.

“Nagasaki’s governor has asked us to increase the number of countries where Japan can export Shine Muscats, and I completely agree,” Koizumi said. “We will not move forward with any licensing process without the consent of growers and prefectural leaders.”

He noted that licensing is part of a broader policy framework the Cabinet approved earlier this year for certain agricultural products.

The Shine Muscat variety, developed over nearly three decades starting in the late 1980s by national agricultural institutes, has been positioned as a promising export product. But the vines were not initially protected outside Japan and eventually spread to China and South Korea, which now export the fruit to Southeast Asia. Japan passed a law in 2021 to restrict the overseas sale of its grape plants.

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