SOURCE: Free Malaysia Today
Taiwan is turning to Japan to find new customers for its sugar apples after top buyer China suspended imports of the luxury fruit amid festering tensions between Beijing and Taipei.
Nurturing fresh appetite in Japan for the knobbly green fruit, prized for its creamy flesh, could help bolster ties between Taipei and Tokyo at a time when China is ramping up political and military pressure on Taiwan, which it claims as its own territory.
Chinese customs authorities banned Taiwanese sugar apple shipments in mid-September, saying they had repeatedly detected pests in the fruit. It halted cargoes of wax apple from the island at the same time.
“The truth is unknown”, Raymond Chen, director of the Taiwan Trade Centre in Tokyo, told reporters when asked about the reason for the ban.
“It was a sudden notice and (the decision) is having a huge impact on Taiwan’s agricultural sector.”
China had been the key destination for sugar apple exports from the island, with 95% of shipments heading for the mainland market in the first eight months of this year.
Beijing’s decision prompted the Taiwan Trade Centre in Tokyo into immediate action, calling on Japanese people to buy sugar apples to fill the void created by Beijing’s ban. Holding a news conference and collaborating with companies that promotes sugar apple through campaigns with YouTubers.
Chen said Taiwan aims to triple exports to Japan to 15 tonnes by the end of 2021.
That would follow a surge in Japanese imports of Taiwanese pineapples after China suspended cargoes of that fruit in February. Shipments to Japan in the first eight months of 2021 were eight-times higher than the previous year.
Harawii, a Toyama prefecture-based company that distributes fruit from Taiwan in Japan, sells sugar apple on an e-commerce platform operated by Taiwanese travel startup KKday, whose core business has been hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic.
The company has been collaborating with restaurants and YouTubers to introduce people to the sweet fruit, which is sometimes known as custard apple or Buddha’s head. It is not cheap at ¥5,700 (US$51.27) for 900g of frozen sugar apple, but Chen hopes people will soon develop a taste for it.
Taiwan has been seeking out other markets as well and it plans to export sugar apple to neighbours including Hong Kong and Singapore.