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American Ambassador Buys Fukushima Products

American Ambassador John Roos made a public display of support for Fukushima products by visiting a shop in Tokyo and buying Fukushima sake:

A prefectural official showed him several goods such as a tofu product, and a brand of sake which won a top prize in a national competition last year.

Roos, who is a sake fan, tested 3 different brands, and bought one of them as a present for his wife.

A senior prefectural official says he deeply appreciates the ambassador’s visit and hopes the visit will help consumers realize the safety of Fukushima products.

Any liquor on sale now was probably brewed before March 11th, so it’s not exactly a direct statement of confidence in the safety of products harvested after the nuclear accident. Nevertheless, it was a very nice show of support for the economic recovery of Fukushima.

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14 comments - What do you think? Posted by James - April 22, 2011 at 3:56 pm

Categories: Foreigners in Japan, Japanese Food Tags:

Craig

‘Any liquor on sale now was probably brewed before March 11th’

I bet he checked that out in advance
Aceface

Fukushiman should gave Roos a glass of low contaminated sake for that 50 miles warning crap.

Fat Tony

Just what I wanted to say. But, listening to him speak, he is obviously a very charismatic man, so hopefully everybody will feel the need to rush out and spend their money.
nanashi

I can understand why they do it (a little PR spin). But at the same time, it is also rather insulting to the intelligence of those who know how to gather information from a variety of sources, take a little time to analyze them, and then come to their own meaningful and prudent conclusion.

So yeah, while it is nice to see officials like Roos, Edano, and Kan doing these photo-ops consuming foods declared safe from the area, they aren’t going to easily change the minds of those who don’t trust what these government officials are saying; those who have always been skeptical of governments and corporations when it comes to damage control PR; those who are influenced too easily be media hype; and those who are generally misinformed about the subject at hand. In this particular case with the issue being radiation, there are going to be those who will take a better safe than sorry attitude no matter what anyone says.

John L

Keep drinking, Mr. Ambassador.
Stereo

I feel uneasy with this type of “support”. Food from Fukushima is contaminated with radiation and the government shows the data in their HP.
http://wwwcms.pref.fukushima.jp/download/1/mon230418-20.pdf
For example, spinach from Iwaki, Fukushima contains 560 Bq/kg of Iodine 131.
The food is sold in the market because the radiation level is below standard. But it is by no means good for health. I just buy uncontaminated food.
ryuugakusei

The uncontaminated food could well contain that same amount of radiation but you can’t tell because it is below the limit and so is allowed to be sold and they don’t print on the labels Iodine-131 levels.

While setting these limits is always somewhat arbitrary. The standard is usually if you have one group of otherwise equivalent people who eat food that has contamination at or near the maximum versus another group that eat food with minimal amounts of contamination you couldn’t statistically tell the difference between the two.

I guess my point is if it below the maximum level and able to be sold: don’t worry about it.
RMilner

Everything contains “radiation” and always has. The body can deal with low levels of radiation because it has evolved in a low level environment. The safety limits are set low because it’s difficult to be precise about the dangerous level.

Keep the spinach in your fridge for a couple of days and some of the iodine will decay to a non-radioactive isotope.

Stereo

Iodine 131 in natural environment is extremely small. Before the accident, food contained zero or undetectable level of I131, much much smaller than 560 Bq/kg. You should not confuse radioactive material in food with back ground radiation which mainly comes from the space.

ponta

“You should not confuse radioactive material in food with back ground radiation which mainly comes from the space.”

And it comes when some countries detonate a nuclear device

わが国の米、小麦および土壌における90Srと137Cs濃度の長期モニタリングと変動解析

http://rms1.agsearch.agropedia.affrc.go.jp/contents/JASI/pdf/JASI/72-4549.pdf

Stereo

I am talking about I131. You showed data about Sr90 and Cs137. They are different.
I am talking about spinach. You showed data about rice. How can you compare them?
Spinach from Fukushima contained 180 Bq/kg of Cs137 on April 20, 2011.
White rice in various places in Japan contained on average 0.02 Bq/kg of Cs137 in year 2000.
I can at least say 0.02 is much much smaller than 180.

The safety standard for vegetables is 500 Bq/kg for Cs134 and Cs137 combined. Spinach from Fukushima contained 180 Bq/kg of Cs137 and another 180 Bq/kg of Cs134. I am not comfortable with 360 out of 500. I would just buy uncontaminated spinach from elsewhere that is available at the same price as before the earthquake.

Remember, the only good thing about eating contaminated spinach is that it reduces the compensation liability of TEPCO. If TEPCO does not have enough money, the government will help pay the compensation and I am happy with such use of tax money. What I do not like is to spend tax money for much costly healthcare expense for people who ate contaminated food.
ponta

“How can you compare them?”

Obviously, as I quoted, I am responding to your statement “You should not confuse radioactive material in food with back ground radiation which mainly comes from the space.”

” What I do not like is to spend tax money for much costly healthcare expense for people who ate contaminated food.”

Eating food without contamination is probably better than eating food contaminated with radiation, for that matter, pesticide chemical, artificial hormone,

But the point is if eating the food under legal limit will cause health problem.

As far as I know, majority of scientists says no, or at least negligible. Probably in terms of health care, it is much much better not to be near someone smoking or not to eat junk food too much.

That said, it is okay for someone who doubt the opinions of the scientists and avoid the food suspicious of any risk.

But remember winning the compensation for harmful rumor is one thing, whether the food in question really cause health problem is another.

ponta

国立がん研究センターの見解と提案

１．現時点の放射性物質による健康被害については、チェルノブイリ事故等のこれまでのエビデンスから、原子炉において作業を行っている方々を除けば、ほとんど問題がないといえる。
２．現在、暫定的に定められている飲食物の摂取制限の指標については、十分すぎるほど安全といえるレベルである。

http://www.ncc.go.jp/jp/

「都内の食品・水の放射線量と安全性」（PDF）

http://www.ncc.go.jp/jp/information/pdf/shiryo4.pdf

miyoyon

I started to folllow @AmbassadorRoos before the earthquake and I think it is fair to say that he is doing a quite good job after 3/11.
But anyway why didn’t he buy all the three Sake bottles but only one?
A little bit disappointed Sir!

American Ambassador Buys Fukushima Products

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