Yonezawa beef is delicious, but Yonezawa's local place-branding strategy goes beyond that

Text / Hsieh Tzu-han (Visiting Research Fellow, National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies, Japan)

How should a place promote its own "brand strategy plan"? Who should decide a place's "brand image"? The case of Yonezawa City in Yamagata Prefecture, Japan, may be worth Taiwan's reference.

In Yonezawa City, Yamagata Prefecture, known for "Yonezawa beef," the most obvious brand image for outsiders is Yonezawa beef cuisine, but for locals it has instead created the problem of "no one knows what kind of town it is other than beef." How does Yonezawa promote the brand image it wants? This article interviews Mr. Ito Hikaru, Director of the "Industry Department, Agriculture and Forestry Division, Yonezawa Brand Promotion Office" of Yonezawa City, sharing the process of Yonezawa's promotion of a "people-oriented" town brand strategy plan.

(To deeply grasp rural development and local revitalization under Taiwan's real context, "Upstream and Downstream" is collaborating with the "Rural Development Foundation" on a "Rural Development Special Topic," using a series of articles to explore Taiwan's current situation and Japan's policy trends. To read the full series, please click here.)