Business Overview
Beverage DivisionFocusing on coffee and tea, we will continue to take on the challenge of becoming a group of manufacturing professionals in the beverage field.
Our beverage business primarily consists of our coffee business and tea business. Both businesses are characterized by being manufacturers with our own domestic processing factories.
The coffee business supplies raw materials such as green coffee beans, roasted beans, and instant coffee that meets customer needs by utilizing Marubeni Group's strong green coffee bean procurement network from around the world, our instant coffee factories in its two major coffee-producing countries (Brazil and Vietnam), and our own domestic roasting factory (Oyama City, Tochigi). In the tea business, we supply raw materials that meet the needs of our customers, focusing on Japanese tea, by utilizing the stable procurement of raw materials from major tea-producing regions that we have built up over the years and our own processing plant in the largest tea-producing region in Japan (Makinohara City, Shizuoka).
We will strengthen sustainable initiatives with domestic and overseas production areas, further promote product development while developing products with a higher degree of processing from the traditional raw material business, and focus more and more on the commercial and household product markets.
For example, as the popularity of Japanese food is increasing worldwide, we will not only follow the current trends but also seek new attraction of coffee and tea in ways such as starting research and product development efforts to create flavors that will be appreciated overseas, in order to promote the appeal of Japanese tea to the rest of the world. With our technology and the logistics capabilities of the Marubeni Group, we will continue to take on further challenges domestically and internationally, aiming to become a group of manufacturing professionals in the beverage field.
Food and Agricultural Products DivisionWe will support the diversification of lifestyles with convenience and create a comfortable dining experience.
Our food and agricultural products business procures and supplies frozen, processed, and chilled food products that meet the increasingly diverse needs of consumers to our business partners nationwide.
For example, we have established production area partnerships with vegetable processors throughout Japan, from Hokkaido to Kyushu, to develop and propose original frozen vegetables in response to customer requests. We frequently visit production areas and manage from the fields (variety and seeding) to create products. We also handle domestic fruits and vegetables, processed agricultural products, and rice. Similarly to frozen vegetables, we promote initiatives with production areas to develop and provide a variety of products that fully utilize the quality of the ingredients.
Furthermore, in the agricultural products business, Marubeni's global network is utilized to import fruits, and we have established a close relationship of trust with one of the largest suppliers in the Philippines through long-standing transactions. This relationship provides a stable supply of high-quality fruits such as bananas and pineapples.
With the growing need for convenient food due to changes in social trends such as a shrinking workforce, an aging population, and an increase in dual-earner households, we will focus on meal kits, frozen lunch boxes, infant food, hospital food, nursing food, emergency food, and fully prepared food products. We will continue to develop products that meet consumer needs and are in line with market trends.
For example, with the increase in dual income households, the need for infant food is growing every year. We are developing and proposing small chopped frozen vegetables and processed products that are convenient for making homemade baby food. Especially with infant food, our quality control unit conducts factory audits of contract manufacturers and provides guidance on sanitation management in accordance with management standards appropriate for the development of products in order to produce safe and secure products using domestically produced raw materials.
In addition, with the aging of society, we are focusing on areas such as hospital food and nursing care food to support healthy and wholesome aging. Over the years, we have sold products such as nutritionally modified foods and soft foods for hospitals, elderly care facilities, and home care patients. Recently, we have been proactively developing fully prepared food products in response to labor shortage in the food service industry by collecting feedback from dieticians and other professionals in the field to respond to diverse needs.
Food Raw Material DivisionToday, we continue to provide a stable supply of worldwide food raw materials that are indispensable to the daily lives of Japanese people.
Our food raw materials business is responsible for the intermediate part of the food ingredients trade that connects upstream to downstream in the strong value chain that the Marubeni Group has established.
Marubeni is one of Japan's top companies in terms of the volume of grains handled, including wheat and soybeans, which are upstream products, and provides a stable supply of grains procured from all over the world amid concerns about the tight supply and demand of food worldwide.
Downstream, Marubeni has established a strong food distribution network through strategic alliances with major retailers, in addition to its investments in wholesale companies, including the largest specialized confectionery wholesaler, frozen food wholesaler, and processed food and alcoholic beverage wholesaler.
We leverage these strengths to support the Japanese diet by procuring food ingredients such as flour, sugar, and oils and fats, which are indispensable to the Japanese diet, from the Marubeni Group and raw material manufacturers with whom we have long-standing relationships of trust, and supplying them to manufacturers of processed foods such as bread, noodles, and confectionery.
We also focus on procurement and development of imported food raw materials by utilizing the Marubeni Group's solid trading platform. If there is an ingredient or food product that is trending worldwide, we will select and import the raw material from suppliers around the world and share it in a form that is easy for processed food manufacturers to use, bringing new culinary delights to Japanese dining tables. We will also work to develop new production areas to ensure a stable supply of food raw materials in the event of bad weather or disasters somewhere in the world.
“Food” in today's society is full of new stimuli, such as the continuously changing food trends, diversifying tastes and needs over time, and the appearance of new ingredients and food products. We will leverage the strengths of the Marubeni Group and our global network as a general trading company to create new value and pleasure in “food.” We will not only supply domestic products that are only available overseas, but also develop, propose, and provide new food raw materials based on flexible ideas in response to our clients' requests. We will explore imported food raw materials that will become the new essence of the dining table while learning from traditions and trends from around the world,
