FUKUSHIMA CITY (Japan) - ON HIS farm on the rural outskirts of Fukushima City, 73-year-old Akio Abiko digs up burdock roots and worries about the future.
For now, he is donating the roots to a nearby evacuee centre, to garnish rice and help feed those who have fled from the crippled Daiichi nuclear plant about 70km away.
But Mr Abiko and other local farmers wonder if anyone outside this part of north-east Japan will ever again want to buy produce from Fukushima. Mr Abiko used to sell carrots, potatoes and other vegetables from his 9,900 square metre farm to Tokyo. But the chances of that now look unlikely.
'Grown in Fukushima' has become a warning label for those nervous of radiation which has already been found in some vegetables close to the nuclear plant savaged by last month's earthquake and tsunami.
'There is no way we will be able to sell anything,' he said. 'People in Tokyo are just too sensitive about this kind of thing.' A group of farmers came to Tokyo from Fukushima at the weekend, using Geiger counters to show their produce was safe.
Japan's worst crisis since World War II, with the authorities still trying to bring the damaged reactors under control, has sparked widespread fears about the safety of its food. The radiation worries are likely to put a further squeeze on farmers in north-east Japan, where the economy has been on a steady decline for years, hit by a falling birthrate and a rapidly ageing population. -- REUTERS
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