Fri, 10/11/2009 – Jude Fanton
Kizuya-san is a young, new farmer who is very serious about his seed saving. He learnt farming only four years ago and started seed saving soon afterwards.
Nagoya is in Aichi Prefecture and about fifty years ago, when the Japanese government brought in a system to register local vegetables, the Prefecture listed 35 varieties. Here he is with one of our former interns, Masami Sakaban who guided and interpreted for us. Masami works with grandmothers on preserving local varieties.
IMAGE Masami Sakaban and Kazuya holding a traditional local variety of eggplant, in his glasshouse.
Kizuya-san has been collecting and maintaining Aichi vegetables, including the Yayoto Carrot and a long thin purple eggplant. We filmed him collecting seeds of tomatoes, eggplant and okra.