You’ve no doubt seen a bright green beverage take over your local cafes and social media feeds.

Matcha has boomed in popularity over recent years, so much so it has led to a supply strain on Japan’s tea industry. 

Two major Japanese tea brands, Ippodo and Marukyu, last year announced purchase limits on the finely ground green tea powder in response to the growing demand.

It was an unprecedented move that sparked global concerns of a matcha shortage and as Japan heads into the new matcha harvest season, concerns of a shortage are circulating again.

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The Japan Times has reported the growing demand for the product paired with slow production times could result in a global matcha shortage. But it’s a little more complicated than that. 

On one hand, there is no doubt supply is struggling to keep up with demand.

Data from Japan’s Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF) reveals Japan produced 4176 tonnes of matcha in 2023 – a threefold increase from the 1471 tonnes produced in 2010, The Japan Times reports. 

The demand has pushed the Japanese tea industry into overdrive as it attempts to keep up.

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Jason Eng, who manages business partnerships for Japanese tea brand Kametani Tea told The Japan Times that the company had increased production by 10 per cent each year since 2019. 

“There’s a lot of overtime, and also on weekends now, just trying to keep up with demand,” he told the publication. 

It’s also been noted in Australia.

Alan Huynh, the director and founder of Australian matcha brand Matcha Society, tells 9honey Kitchen he noticed demand for matcha within his business began to “heat up” in October last year. 

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“Every month after that, it’s been a 50 to 100 per cent growth month on month.”

On top of increasing sales, the demand is pushing prices up and making lead times longer. Huynh notes that while his company used to be able to expect to receive product from its Japanese supplier within two weeks, now it’s more like three months.

“It makes it really difficult to forecast the inventory that we’re going to go through,” Huynh says.

“So that pretty much means that we need to keep a very clear and concise relationship with our farmers in Japan, so that they constantly communicate to us what the lead time’s like and how much things are going to cost, because at the moment everything’s a bit of a frenzy with prices.”

This is because production of the massively popular green powder is a naturally slow process, per The Japan Times.

The shrubs from which matcha tea leaves are harvested take up to five years to mature then the machines that grind it are slow – one machine can only make enough matcha for about 10 to 12 matcha lattes every hour. 

On top of that, the number of tea farmers in Japan is on the decline, according to MAFF data.

But is there really a total shortage of matcha? Well according to the Global Japanese Tea Association the answer is, “not exactly”. 

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The association notes the seasonal nature of matcha production, with the highest-grade matcha only having one harvest per year, makes it a “naturally scarce” product – something many would argue is what makes it so special. 

However, the Japanese Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries is already encouraging increased matcha production and subsidies have already been implemented to make this happen. It will be a slow process but it will bolster matcha supplies to match demand, the association says. 

And with the new matcha harvesting season set to begin this month, the Global Japanese Tea Association says “there’s no need to worry”.

“The spring harvest is just around the corner and fresh matcha will soon be produced,” the association wrote in a recent post on its website.

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