Tea ceremony classes in Japan bear brunt of matcha boom as prices soar amid shortage

JAPAN – Tea ceremony classes in Japan are bearing the brunt of an acute shortage of

matcha, as a recent global boom in green tea

has led to soaring prices of the product.

While the farm ministry is seeking to increase production of tencha, a tea leaf typically ground into matcha powder, the industry has struggled to respond as the farming population ages and the number of successors dwindles.

“I may have to resort to whisking an empty tea bowl,” said a woman in her 50s, who teaches tea ceremony classes in Tokyo and the neighbouring Saitama prefecture.

She added that she had to switch stores as it became increasingly difficult in the summer of 2025 to buy Kyoto matcha from her usual shop.

With the number of people practising the tea ceremony already falling due to an ageing population, those versed in the art want to avoid additional factors that could drive people away.

But with the prices of tools used in ceremonies also rising, classes have been forced to pass on the costs to students.

In Kyoto prefecture, a surge in inbound tourists seeking matcha products has driven up tencha transaction costs sharply, with the price of new tea leaves from the 2025 season tripling from 2024.

“This is the most chaotic it has been since the Haagen-Dazs shock of 1996,” said Mr Shogo Nakamura, president of Nakamura Tokichi Honten, a tea seller in Uji, Kyoto prefecture. He was referring to the launch of the American premium ice cream brand’s hit green tea flavour, its first product developed specifically for the Japanese market.

“We’ve seen our products being sold on overseas online stores,” he said, referring to unauthorised resellers and knock-off products.

Mr Nakamura said the company has begun imposing purchase limits in response to bulk buying of in-store products by some foreign customers.

Compared with sencha, which is commonly consumed in Japan, tencha requires more time and effort to cultivate, including shielding the plants from the sun and investing in special equipment to process the harvested leaves.

While the current boom in matcha has made switching from sencha to tencha cultivation tempting, some farmers have expressed hesitation, citing uncertainty over how long it will last.

Meanwhile, in Iruma, Saitama prefecture, home to the Kanto region’s most famous tea fields, efforts are under way to trial tencha production and boost sencha output by using abandoned farmland, in the hope of rebuilding the area’s brand.

The city is famous for its flavourful Sayama tea, considered one of Japan’s top three teas alongside Shizuoka and Uji teas. But its brand power has taken a hit as fewer people in Japan have sought loose-leaf tea. KYODO NEWS