A stone’s throw from the Palais Garnier, tourists’ lines dot rue Sainte-Anne, in Paris, known for its Asian cafes, Japanese in particular. Sometimes over ten meters. In slat, ice or pastry, they are waiting to be able to taste matcha, this green powder with a slightly bitter taste, produced from green tea and traditionally used for the tea ceremony in Japan. The craze has been general since the end of 2024, fueled by social networks, which praise the product as a healthier drink than coffee – on Instagram the hashtag #Matcha has 8.6 million publications. To the point of weighing a risk of shortage on the world market.
The fears confirmed in December 2024 when IPPODO, a very famous producer of Kyoto, in Japan, announced on his site a limit of a single product per order, for lack of being able to meet the demand, which has “Exploded beyond all expectations”. On the website of another famous producer, Marukyu Koyamaen, the observation is the same: stock shortage of most products.
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