ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the production, negotiation, and branding of place, space, and “locality” in agro-industrial commodities. The Yamanashi wine industry is comprised of around 90 wineries and maintains its position as the leading producer of wine made from domestically grown grapes in the country. The majority of wine is fermented by a few large wineries owned by multinational corporations. Many academics have begun to conceptualize the shift towards quality production through the perspective of embeddedness. Constructed notions of marketable place are formulated based on the boundaries of their geographic coverage. The most comprehensive of these is the Appellation of Origin (AO). Sales of domestic grapes have felt the effects of trade liberalization policies, while grape production has been hindered by the structural decline of the Japanese farm sector due to the rapid aging of the workforce and the loss of arable land.
