Showa Sangyo sold on Canadian quality | Grain handler, bakery visit Alberta to see and learn about wheat production
McLENNAN, Alta. — One of Japan’s largest millers and bakers wasn’t taking anyone’s word on the Canadian wheat harvest. It wanted to check out the wheat harvest in person.
“The purpose of this trip is to check and see the wheat, the wheat harvest and we like to know about the quality of the wheat,” said Hiroaki Watanabe of Showa Sangyo, one of Japan’s largest grain handlers during the opening of the Cargill elevator in northern Alberta.
“We need 1CW, good bakery needs 1 CW. It is good for us to hear that producers in Canada are looking for the good harvest,” said Watanabe, whose company imports two million tonnes of wheat each year.
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Part of Showa’s milled grain production is sold to Yoshitaka Kumagai’s Ajinomoto Bakery, which produces frozen bakery dough for about 6,000 of Japan’s 15,000 7/11 convenience stores.
With Watanabe acting as an interpreter, Kumagai said he believes it’s important for him and his employees to see where the wheat in their bakery is grown.
“Looking is important, but one time is not enough,” said Kumagai, who travelled to Alberta a year ago to look at crops and will continue to inspect Canadian wheat and canola fields and meet with Canadian farmers.
“We would like to see the machines like combines and the facilities they have for harvest like silos, dryer,” said Kumagai, who wants to continue to buy Canadian wheat.
“The quality of the grain in Canada is pretty higher than the other countries. Showa Sangyo would like to buy Canadian wheat, especially, number one. We like to be stable and have high quality. That is why we will continue to buy 1CW from Canada.”
Watanabe doesn’t yet know how the drought in the American Midwest will affect his business. Japanese millers must buy their grain from the government, which sets prices every six months. With Canada’s good crop, he expects any price jumps to be minimal.
“I have a kind of confidence it will be not so impacted by the U.S. because Canada has pretty much a good harvest this year.”
Watanabe said they would also be looking at the canola harvest, especially high oleic canola for baking.
“The demand for high oleic canola is rapidly increasing for us. The demand is coming from factory, which make rice for bento box, rice for rice cake and they need to use a lot of oil.”
