【iFarm Co., Ltd.】World-Class Japanese Strawberries Grown in the Land of Ice with 1/5th the Electricity Cost: Global Food-Tech Powered by Iceland’s First Plant Factory

Cultivating the World’s Most Delicious Japanese Strawberries in Iceland with 100% Renewable Energy

Hello everyone. I am Keita Iino, representative of iFarm.

Our mission is to revolutionize the global food production system by combining renewable energy with next-generation agricultural systems.

The core of our business lies in the combination of three key factors: "Plant Factory," "Iceland," and "Delicious Japanese Strawberries."

First, why "plant factories"?

Today, due to climate change, severe droughts, and water shortages, traditional outdoor agriculture globally is facing severe limitations and stands at a major turning point.

As a solution, indoor, climate-controlled next-generation agricultural systems that are completely unaffected by weather or external environments are highly sought after. The major benefits of plant factories are that they allow pesticide-free cultivation and the stable, year-round planned production of high-quality produce.

However, the biggest weakness of plant factories is the massive "electricity cost" required to run air conditioning and LED lighting.

To solve this, we focused on "Iceland."

Iceland generates nearly 100% of its electricity from renewable sources, namely hydro and geothermal power. Consequently, its electricity costs are extremely low—about one-third of Japan's, and roughly one-fifth of other European countries.

For a plant factory, where electricity accounts for the majority of running costs, this is the absolute best location.

Furthermore, Iceland is one of the wealthiest countries in the world with high average wages, making it ideal for branding and selling high-end agricultural produce at premium prices.

Geographically, it is located just 3 to 4 hours by flight from major European cities like London and Paris. This means we can establish a rapid logistics route: "完熟 (fully ripened) strawberries harvested in the morning at our Iceland factory can be delivered to restaurants in London or Paris by the evening."

And the crop we cultivate is "Japanese Strawberries."

It is hard to realize when you live in Japan, but Japanese strawberries are undoubtedly the best in the world in terms of flavor, sweetness, and soft texture.

Most strawberries circulated in foreign markets are hard-skinned and sour, bred to withstand long-distance transport. In contrast, Japanese varieties (we cultivate "Benihoppe") are extremely soft and sweet, making it impossible to export them in a fully ripened state from Japan to overseas.

By producing Japanese varieties in our local plant factory using cheap renewable energy, we can deliver them fresh and achieve absolute differentiation against existing foreign varieties.

We are establishing a system to sell them to local affluent consumers and high-end restaurants at premium brand prices of 20,000 to 30,000 yen per kilogram (about 500 yen per single strawberry).

Building a Factory from Scratch in 2 Years: Opening Sales Channels with Support from Government and Airlines

We have established both Japanese and local entities and are driving this project with a small team of professionals.

Our strength lies in our "breakthrough power" and "ability to connect" experts—bringing together plant factory specialists, professional Japanese strawberry farmers, and global expansion experts to turn ideas into reality.

Two years ago, I went to Iceland alone, began negotiations from scratch, and built a factory. Today, we have built strong relationships and receive backing from local power companies, airlines, travel agencies, and government-related organizations.

Locally, we have held events, workshops, and pop-up stores, and have been featured in major local newspapers and radio programs.

Furthermore, we attended agricultural conferences in the Netherlands and Norway, exhibited at the University of Iceland’s Japan Fest, and served our strawberries at the Emperor's Birthday Reception hosted by the Japanese Embassy in Iceland, receiving high praise from guests.

In February this year, we finally began harvesting and selling our strawberries.

Our sales channels target not only B2C personal gift demand but also B2B, focusing on local Michelin-starred restaurants and luxury hotels. The response has been overwhelming, and orders are flooding in faster than we can produce.

Takafumi Horie, the well-known entrepreneur, visited our factory in Iceland and highly praised us, saying, "You did a fantastic job actually making these strawberries grow."

We were also contacted by the Osaka Expo office and directly promoted our project and strawberries to the President of Iceland during his visit to Japan. We were also selected for the national "Monodukuri Subsidy (Global Category)," receiving up to 30 million yen, which we will use to introduce AI-based cultivation management to strengthen our operations.

Targeting the 500-Billion-Yen EU Market: Becoming a Food-Tech Hub Connecting Japan, Iceland, and Europe

As for our roadmap, we will finally transition to the full-scale year-round production (constant harvesting) phase starting this November. Over the next five years, we will scale our production volume and sales, establishing a highly profitable "global food-tech model."

In terms of market size, capturing just 10% of the strawberry market (the affluent segment) within Iceland alone is projected to bring in 1 billion yen in sales.

Furthermore, by utilizing air freight, we will expand to London and Paris. The overall strawberry market in the EU is worth 400 to 500 billion yen, so capturing just 10% of that represents a massive business of over 40 billion yen. We are also planning to expand into processed strawberry goods and package (franchise) sales of plant factories.

We are not just an agricultural venture growing strawberries, but a hub company connecting Japan’s bio-technologies, Iceland’s renewable resources, and the EU market.

Currently, we are raising 30 million yen to maximize harvest volume and strengthen our structure. We invite you to join us in this challenge to transform the global food production system. Thank you very much.

Q&A and Feedback

Commentator (Mr. Fukutani): Thank you, Mr. Iino, for the presentation. Focus on Iceland's "dirt-cheap electricity costs" powered by geothermal and hydro, and cultivating the world’s best Japanese strawberries there to target the European market, is an extremely logical and dynamic business model.

I have a question: you are aiming for premium branding at 20,000 to 30,000 yen per kg (500 yen per strawberry). Will the target be limited to the wealthy and high-end restaurants? Do you have plans to deliver these delicious strawberries to general consumers in the future?

Mr. Iino: Thank you for the question.

As the first step, our target is indeed limited to luxury hotels, starred restaurants, and gifts for the wealthy, establishing a thorough premium brand position. In the startup phase, because production volume is limited, it is more efficient to focus on high-margin sales channels rather than distributing to general supermarkets where wholesale prices drop.

However, once we expand the factory scale and lower production costs, we will expand distribution to general supermarkets (we have already received numerous inquiries) so that more people can enjoy Japanese strawberries at affordable prices.

Mr. Fukutani: Understood. Build the brand first, and then approach the mass market as production expands.

Also, why was it necessary to "cultivate locally in Iceland" instead of "building a factory in Japan and exporting"? It seems building a factory in Japan would make it easier to accumulate know-how and secure staff.

Mr. Iino: There are two major reasons: "strawberry logistics" and the "Japanese strawberry market."

First, Japanese strawberries (fully ripened) are very soft, so if we try to fly them from Japan to Europe, they get damaged during transit, and quality cannot be maintained by the time they reach stores. There was a case where a local municipality exported super-premium strawberries to London, but it cost 10,000 yen per pack, and because they had to harvest them before they were fully ripe to prevent damage, they lacked the sweetness of true Japanese strawberries. To deliver them in delicious condition, local production is the only option.

Second, in Japan, delicious strawberries are already widely available at cheap prices, so we cannot compete on price if we build expensive plant factories there. In contrast, European strawberries are hard and sour, so if we can provide fresh, Japanese-quality strawberries locally, we have a blue ocean where they sell even with a premium price of tens of thousands of yen per kg. This is why local production in Iceland makes sense.

Mr. Fukutani: You overcome the logistical weakness of Japanese strawberries by building a plant factory locally, monopolizing a blue ocean in Europe where there are no competitors. That is a highly logical strategy.

Since you started sales in February, what is your "biggest challenge" in scaling up, and how do you plan to overcome it?

Mr. Iino: Actually, shortly after our first successful harvest and sales in February, we experienced a strawberry disease outbreak in the factory, causing our harvest volume to temporarily plunge. This was a major challenge.

To overcome this, we completely revised our cultivation operations over the last six months.

Instead of flying in seedlings from Japan, we switched to a method of "growing Japanese varieties from seeds locally," which has an extremely low risk of disease. Furthermore, we dispatched experienced strawberry farmers from Japan to Iceland to establish a 24-hour production management system.

Through these measures, we have cleared the disease issues and stabilized production. We are now ready to enter the phase of year-round mass harvesting and mass sales starting this November.

Mr. Fukutani: You quickly solved the agricultural disease issue by shifting to seed cultivation and dispatching professional farmers. Your execution is impressive.

With your drive to involve governments and embassies, including the President of Iceland, I look forward to the day when world-class Japanese strawberries spread across Europe. Thank you very much.

Mr. Iino: Thank you very much.