Kumamoto Quake Damages Japan's Top Tomato Production Center

Yatsushiro, Kumamoto Pref., Aug. 26 (Jiji Press)--The July 28 earthquake in Kumamoto Prefecture has dealt a blow to Japan's top tomato production center in the city of Yatsushiro, damaging irrigation systems and greenhouse equipment.

Yatsushiro, where a seismic intensity of upper 6 was recorded on the Japanese scale of 7, topped the country's municipalities in tomato harvest volume for the 2024 winter-to-spring shipping season.

In the city, farmers plant seedlings from mid-August and begin shipping tomatoes around October. The quake struck when farmers were preparing for the upcoming growing season.

The agriculture ministry has learned through interviews with the Yatsushiro agricultural cooperative that only about half of the planned seedlings had been planted as of late August.

Some irrigation channels collapsed, halting water supplies in parts of the area.

[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]