DISABLED JAPANESE PACK VENDING MACHINE WITH BAKED SWEET POTATOES

A vending machine stocked with baked sweet potatoes was placed in this southwestern Japanese city on April 8 in a project linking agriculture and welfare, Shunsuke Ichimiya reported for Mainichi Daily.

The rare vending machine introduced by Hyuga-based company Nofuku Sangyo is stocked with potatoes baked and canned by disabled people working at factories in the prefectural cities of Hyuga and Nobeoka, who receive a portion of the profits.

It is located along Route 10 at 3 Kamikawahigashi, Miyakonojo, Miyazaki Prefecture. In March, the company also set up another machine at the Oita Matsuoka rest stop on the Higashi-Kyushu Expressway in Oita.

Yuji Kodama, 66, president of Nofuku Sangyo, was thinking about how to utilize the approximately one-hectare of farmland he had inherited from his late father.

Then he came up with the idea of selling baked sweet potatoes from a vending machine, which would allow disabled people to work even on rainy days without incurring additional labor costs.

With the cooperation of Sunkey Co., a vending machine sales company based in the city of Kagoshima, he built a special machine.

It looks like an ordinary vending machine, but when you put money in it and push the button, an aluminum can with a pack of baked Beniharuka sweet potatoes inside pops out.

Buyers can choose between hot and cold products, priced at 500 yen (about $4.5) for the regular 190 grams and 400 yen (about $3.6) for the 110-gram portions. Empty cans placed in the collection box next to the vending machine are reused. Sunao Matsuoka, 66, a sales representative of Nofuku Sangyo, commented, "People could use the canned potatoes as preserved food or gifts, as they have a shelf life of one year."

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