Shonan olive oil

Shonan Olive Oil is built around olives cultivated and harvested in Kanagawa’s Shonan area, with Ninomiya and neighboring communities forming the main setting. The area is described through sea, mountains, Sagami Bay-facing hills, and the warm conditions that Ninomiya has used for a new specialty crop.

The farms make that setting visible. Farm Village Shonan in Nakai has about 4,000 olive trees, and Universal Farm in Ninomiya has about 600. In this setting, local character is concrete: rows of trees on Shonan hills, fields facing Sagami Bay, long sunshine, and farmland being brought into a town crop project.

The name Shonan Olive Oil points to olives grown and harvested in Shonan, then pressed as Shonan-produced oil. Ninomiya Town connects the oil with fruit from Ninomiya and surrounding areas, while the national trademark listing ties the product to olives from Shonan’s sea-and-mountain landscape.

Following that boundary, the oil family is clearest through fruit, farms, and pressing: Shonan-grown olives, Ninomiya and nearby communities, the Hiratsuka press, and farms such as Farm Village Shonan and Universal Farm.

At harvest time, Shonan olives are picked by hand, fruit by fruit. Harvested olives go to a pressing facility in Hiratsuka within 24 hours to maintain freshness. Only about 7% of one olive fruit becomes Shonan Olive Oil.

The 7% figure gives the process a tangible scale. Olives have strong bitterness and are difficult to eat raw, so processing is essential; after pressing, the residue is used as feed or fertilizer. Freshness and aroma come from the practical rhythm of hand-picking, the Hiratsuka facility, the 24-hour window, and the small yield from each fruit.

Ninomiya’s olive work developed through specific farming steps. In Heisei 23, locally grown olive oil drew town interest; in Heisei 24, Ninomiya opened a 17-are trial field in Isshiki and planted 60 trees across seven varieties.

The town also subsidized 974 seedlings for 30 farmers, and later planned collaboration among growers, processors, and sellers through the Shonan Olive Promotion Council. Around Ninomiya, about 30 farms work on olive cultivation, and Shonan Olive Meister figures include Jiro Hamada and Hideo Matsuki. Continuity here is visible in trial plots, seedlings, farm participation, and the commerce association network around the crop.

Shonan olives around Ninomiya also move through local experiences. Olive-field tours, harvest experiences, oil comparison lectures, workshops, and a November event at Shonan Olive no Sato bring fields, fruit, and visitors into the same seasonal setting.

The leaves and branches have their own paths. Local Shonan olives are used for tea and beauty goods, and leaves and branches are used in plant-dyed handmade items; Ninomiya also lists salted olives, foods, cosmetics, and tea among olive uses. If the word culture fits here, it means concrete practices: fruit picked in the field, oil tasted in a lecture, leaves used for dye, and a town crop taking several everyday forms.