Japanese region getting ready for tea festival
Local authorities and companies of Shizuoka, the heartland of Japan's tea industry, are gearing up for the fourth World O-Cha Festival. The four-day event, held from October 28 at the Shizuoka Convention and Arts Centre, will celebrate all things tea with a vast array of tea-related events. The Shizuoka festival will include exhibitions on tea culture from around the world, including a tasting area, as well as displays of tea utensils, machinery and confectionary that incorporates tea. An international competition for the best-tasting green tea will also be held. Shizuoka is the most important tea region in Japan accounting for almost half of country's output. Its inhabitants have far lower incidences of many forms of cancer, which some have linked with the relatively high amounts of green tea that they consume.