PapaWasabi

It's cherry time again. While some booms come and go, the Japanese are still fond of sampling the earliest harvest of the season. With US cherries, that honor goes to California. While there are some who say...aw, what the heck - I'll go out on a limb...I also say that cherries from the California desert pale in comparison to Northwest and Canadian cherries. However, they get a good month's head start at least over the northwest season, and take advantage of that by making a splash, along with a tidy profit. Though US cherries must be fumigated before leaving for Japan, they can still bring in over $100 a tray to the farmer, or a million dollars for even a smaller orchard. After fumigation costs, air freight, spoilage, custom's fees, taxes and mark-up, the result is the 298 yen cup of cherries in the picture. About 3 bucks for 8 or 10 cherries. Unbelievably, some people along the line may lose money, as the only party guaranteed fat profit margins are the farmer (assuming his crop didn't fail again - cherries are very delicate and an untimely rainstorm can undo a crop a week before harvest) and the supermarket (assuming their customers actually buy the stuff, not always a safe assumption in the current economy). Still, there are buyers, and that shows that there are still plenty of Japanese with money to burn.