Word: dieting
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...Yokado (a major supermarket chain) runs out of them after 3 p.m.," says Tomoyuki Horiuchi, sales representative of Tokyo Seika Boeki Co., Ltd., fruit and vegetables wholesale company. Hiromi Ohtaki of Dole Japan, a leading banana importer, sees the boom in sales as largely due to Morning Banana Diet - bananas don't normally sell well during summer, and this year's summer has been especially hot. Still, over the past 4 months, demand has driven Dole Japan to increase its banana imports by upward of 25%, and even then supplies could not keep pace with demand. "In a way this...
...Morning Banana Diet regime is simple: A banana (or as many as you want) and room temperature water for breakfast; eat anything you like for lunch and dinner (by 8 p.m.). A three o'clock snack is okay, but no desserts after meals, and you have to go to bed before midnight. Sumiko Watanabe, a pharmacist in Osaka designed this stress-free diet to help increase the metabolism of her husband Hitoshi Watanabe, who had been rather overweight. In due course, Mr. Watanabe lost 37 pounds and introduced the diet on mixi, one of Japan's largest social networking services...
...Professor Masahiko Okada of Niigata University School of Medicine questions the hype around the banana diet. The human body has three essential nutrients - carbohydrates, fat and protein -, he says, and "the golden rule is to balance these three nutrients and a daily calorie intake. Once you understand that, you don't have to be swayed by the fad diet any more, whether it is a konnyaku (alimentary yam paste) or a banana diet." But a nation prone to dieting fads often ignores such sober advice...
...Ohtaki. Dole Japan is trying to make up the shortfall by negotiating distribution deals with Dole corporations in other countries. Supplying the spike in demand will be lucrative, because banana prices in Japan have risen about 20% as a result of supply shortages that have coincided with the diet...
...Bananas are hardly the first fad diet to create shortages in Japan's consumer markets. During the 1970s, there were similar runs on black tea fungus, oolong tea and konnyaku; during the 1980s it was baby formula, banana and boiled egg; then, in the '90s, came apple, nata de coco, cocoa and chili pepper; and during this decade black vinegar, carrot juice, soy milk, beer yeast and toasted soybean flour (kinako). Last year's fermented soybean (natto) diet emptied supermarket shelves. Based on experience, Horiuchi predicts that the banana boom will last only another month or so. "In the past...