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Salad snatchers reap 130 kilos of Hokkaido asparagus
SAPPORO -- More than 130 kilograms of asparagus, popular in high-class restaurants in Tokyo, have been stolen from fields before harvest in southern Hokkaido, police and growers said Saturday.
Officials of Asuken, an agricultural corporation, claimed that "professionally trained" farmers stole some 135 kilograms of asparagus worth 135,000 yen from their fields after finding evidence that specialist tools were used to reap the vegetables.
In the Asuken fields in Oiwake where they grow white and green asparagus, mostly the white variety was stolen, which is used for salads in high-class French restaurants in Tokyo and Osaka.
The official said that the vegetables were stolen over four days on May 28, June 22, 23 and 27.
"After the first day, we tried to keep an eye on our fields, but they came at a time when we left them unguarded," said Kyoko Yagi, president of Asuken. (Mainichi Shimbun, Japan, July 5, 2003)