Today’s News from the Farm is an interview with Chiho Watanabe, one of our interns. She is one half or our 2025-2026 Japanese Agricultural Training Program cohort. She, like Kouki (you can read an interview with him here) came to Full Belly Farm last September and will be with us until the beginning of October when she’ll head to UC Davis for a few months of classes before heading back to Japan. She usually is the one asking me questions about how various aspects of the CSA work, so it was great to be the one getting to ask the questions! I learned so much from talking with her and know you will too!
In addition to all Chiho’s great work at the farm and at the Saturday Palo Alto farmers market, she’s been sampling various burgers with Kouki on their way back from the market. If you’ve got a favorite burger place, let them know by sending me an email! A few folks sent recommendations last time, which they’ve tried out and enjoyed.
– Elaine Swiedler, CSA Manager
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Where are you from? Did you have any connection to farming as a kid?
Osaka. It’s a big city. No one is farming in my family. My father worked for a steel company, in the office. Now he is retired. My mother had some part time jobs, and took care of me and my older bother.
What did you do in college?
I studied agriculture.
How did you decide on agriculture?
First, I liked eating. But also, I was interested in food self sufficiency rates, how much food a country produces for itself. Japan has low self sufficiency, lots of imports. In junior high school, I got interested in self sufficiency and wanted to help and decided to study agriculture.
When was the first time you worked on a farm?
During university, for one week. It was a mixed vegetable farm. It was a long time ago, but I remember picking cucumbers and spinach. And doing a lot of weeding.
Then what did you do after college?
I decided to work for a wholesaler in Tokyo, the Tokyo Metropolitan Wholesale Market [note from Elaine: Chiho showed me this guide, which was really helpful and informative, especially page 3]. I wanted to help farmers get a fair price and I was working directly with the farmers, or co-ops, discussing pricing and quantities.
I focused just on shiitake and nameko mushrooms, from all over Japan. Every day I talked to the farmer, farmer co-ops, or big companies to get quantities and to negotiate their prices. Then I would talk to the customers, who were intermediate wholesalers or specific stores and restaurants. I worked there for seven years. During my last year, I was in charge of 1 billion yen in sales ($6.3 million dollars). It was really hard work, really long days. But it was incredibly rewarding and an experience that helped me grow.
Why did you decide to do this program?
I wanted to live abroad for a longer period of time. I wanted to work on my English; it’s spoken so many places that it seems like it would be very useful for meeting people all over the world. I didn’t have the money to travel when I was in university so I first had to work to save up the money. Also, I was tired of my job and needed a break.
I wanted to learn agriculture in America, so I joined this program. I want to learn how to sell at a fair price. When I worked at the wholesaler, the farmers wanted to know why the prices were so cheap and were angry but I didn’t have good answers. I understand demand and supply but I wanted to get new ideas about agriculture.
Did you have any other farming experience before coming here?
Yes, the Training Program has us work on a farm for two months. I was at a farm in Osaka that grows eggplant and taro. I mostly did harvesting, weeding. The farm owner was a woman which was new and different for me. The farmers I had met before were all men. She was really powerful and I really respect her. I talked a lot with her about selling, employee management, and other things.
What have been some of your favorite things to do here?
Picking flowers and using the weed whacker. It’s a useful machine. And I like working with the sheep, even feeding milk to the bummer lambs. I hadn’t worked with animals in Japan. It’s very interesting. And I like transplanting.
What are some things you still want to do?
I want to work with dried flowers and learn how to dry them. I want to learn more about the flowers – the names, making mixed bouquets and wreaths. And I want to talk more with Dru and Paola about how they sell and promote the produce, especially to the wholesalers, and I want to learn more about the wholesale customers. I also want to learn more from Andrew about planting planning, what goes it what field. I want to go to the other two markets to interact with our other customers and practice my English more!
What are your favorite things to eat that we grow?
Potatoes. Sometimes I eat potatoes for every meal! I really like Bintje because they’re so soft. Boiled and fried potatoes are my favorite. I also like cauliflower and zucchini. I am so happy that the zucchini is here. I like making soup, both with the cauliflower and the zucchini.
What do you want to do when you go back to Japan?
I want to focus on growing flowers in Japan. Maybe work for a flower farm for a few years to get growing and management skills. I want to do dried flowers but it is so humid there that I will need to figure out how to do that.
