Matcha demand more than doubles the price of raw material in Japan
Tencha’s average shipment price was 8,562 yen per kilogram in 2025, while higher sencha prices pushed shoppers towards other drinks and raised post-boom concerns for farmers.
- Japanese tea farmers are shifting production away from sencha, the nation's most popular tea, to tencha, the leaf used to make matcha.
- This shift is driven by a surge in global and domestic demand for matcha, which has caused the price of tencha to more than double in a year.
- The move away from sencha has led to a sharp contraction in its output and higher prices, causing it to lose customers to other beverages.
Japanese tea farmers are changing what they produce to benefit from matcha’s popularity.
Production is being redirected from sencha, the country’s most popular tea, towards tencha.
Sencha output has consequently contracted sharply, with higher prices making it harder to afford.
Tencha is the tea leaf that becomes matcha after being finely ground.
Strong buying in Japan and overseas lifted its average shipment price to 8,562 yen per kilogram in 2025, more than twice the figure a year earlier.
The Japanese Association of Tea Production said this was the fifth successive annual increase.
Demand jumped last autumn, and 30-gram matcha tins from Ikeda Seicha Co. quickly sold out on sales websites.
Kenta Ikeda, chief executive of the tea seller in Kagoshima Prefecture in southwestern Japan, said, “People bought as much (matcha) as we had in stock.”
The scramble by some buyers to clear all available tins has now eased.
Even so, inquiries from within Japan and overseas remain strong.
Matcha’s popularity rose sharply last year after influencers featured it on social media.
The Tea Industry Chamber of Kagoshima says the broader trend began much earlier, with Starbucks’ introduction of a matcha latte in 2006.
The drink attracted particular attention in the United States because of its healthy image.
Toru Mitsumura, a senior official at the Tea Industry Chamber of Kagoshima, linked the loss of customers to higher sencha prices.
The result, he said, was “Japanese tea being replaced on supermarket shelves by barley tea and other beverages”.
The longer-term concern lies with tea farmers.
Mitsumura said farmers could face difficulties when demand for matcha cools if sencha has already lost its enthusiasts.
[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]
