Japan seeks to win over skeptics in plan to serve Fukushima food at Olympics

FUKUSHIMA - For years, Japan's government has sought to convince consumers that food from Fukushima is safe despite the nuclear disaster there eight years ago. But will it serve the region's produce at the Tokyo Olympics?

It's a thorny subject for the authorities. They pitched the 2020 Summer Games in part as a chance to showcase the recovery of areas affected by the 2011 tsunami and nuclear disaster.

Government officials tout strict checks on food from the region as evidence that the produce is completely safe, but it remains unclear whether athletes and sports teams from around the world will be convinced.

Producers in the region of Fukushima, in the northeast of the main Honshu Island, are keen for their agricultural products to be served at the Olympic Village and have submitted a bid to the organizers.

"The Fukushima region has put forward food from 187 producers and is second only to Hokkaido (Island) when it comes to meeting the specified criteria in terms of range of products," said Shigeyuki Honma, assistant director general of the local government's agriculture and forestry planning division.

"Fukushima wants to serve athletes its rice, its fruits, beef and vegetables. But the committee still has to decide."

In the years since the nuclear disaster, when tsunami waves overwhelmed the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, strict measures have been in place to screen all manner of local products.

And officials say the figures speak for themselves.

Japan allows a maximum of 100 becquerels of cesium radioactivity per kilogram, or Bq/kg. The European Union, by comparison, sets that level at 1,250 Bq/kg and the US at 1,200.

From April 2018 to March this year, 9.21 million bags of rice were examined, with not a single one exceeding the Japanese radioactivity limit.

The same for 2,455 samples of fruit and vegetables, 4,336 pieces of meat and 6,187 ocean fish.

"Only river fish and wild mushrooms have on just six occasions been found to exceed the limits," said Kenji Kusano, director of the Fukushima Agricultural Technology Centre, in Koriyama, the government's main screening site.

But the figures have only gone some way to reassuring foreign officials: Numerous countries including South Korea and the United States maintain restrictions on the import of some or all produce from Fukushima.

South Korea, which is currently locked in a dispute with Japan over wartime issues, has been vocal about its concerns ahead of the Olympics, even raising the possibility of bringing in its own kitchen and food.

"We have requested the Olympic organizers that provide objective data verified by an independent third body," the South Korean Sports and Olympic Committee said in a statement earlier this year.

"Since Japan repeatedly said its food from Fukushima is safe, we have demanded they provide statistics and data to back up their claims," an official with the committee said.

Agence France-Presse