August 9, 2024

As an initiative for youth cultivation and education, since 1978 Kikkoman has been sponsoring international educational exchanges hosted by Youth For Understanding (YFU), a U.S.-based international non-profit organization. Support is provided for a short summer exchange program that invites about 20 American high school students to Japan, and a one-year study abroad in the U.S. program to Japanese high school students. We are cultivating talented individuals with the ambition to make their dreams come true by fostering intercultural understanding and respect through the experience of life in each host country.

On July 8, we invited 23 American high school students visiting Japan and their host families to our Noda Plant for the YFU Kikkoman Summer Activity. The event included a plant tour for in-depth learning about soy sauce as well as a hands-on soy sauce-making experience to promote intercultural understanding and youth international exchange.

During the plant tour, students observed modern-day soy sauce production that uses the latest technology and equipment, as well as traditional soy sauce making carried out in Goyogura (the Imperial Soy Sauce Brewery) where soy sauce purveyed to the Imperial Household Agency is brewed to this day. Along with learning about the process (honjozo method) for making soy sauce by utilizing the natural power of microorganisms to ferment and age the basic ingredients of soybeans, wheat, salt and water that has been used since the beginning of the Edo period (mid-seventeenth century), the students came to understand that Kikkoman employs this method at all its production plants located in Japan and overseas, providing high-quality, delicious soy sauce to more than 100 countries worldwide. 

For the soy sauce-making experience, students used simple equipment to recreate parts of the soy sauce production process, including basic ingredient mixing and moromi (soy sauce koji and brine mixture) pressing. Participants’ hands-on experience led to fun learning about how Kikkoman Soy Sauce is made.

To close the event, each exchange student took the stage to share their impressions of the plant tour and what they had learned throughout the day. Many comments of discovery and surprise regarding this familiar seasoning, such as, “I did not realize that it took so long to make soy sauce” and “I learned that microorganisms play an important role in fermentation and aging” were shared. Through this event, students realized the depth and complexity of soy sauce.

Also, a representative student gave a speech on the importance of understanding and respecting cultures outside of your own, and her own personal account of how food acts as a means of communication and storyteller that does not require language, which was received with great applause.

Kikkoman will continue to promote the international exchange of young generations by sponsoring the YFU international educational exchange program.