• But this year’s fair will see 1 percent of the chocolate sales donated to two humanitarian associations

Arab News Japan

TOKYO: In the chic Ginza district of Tokyo, a department store, like many other department stores in the city, celebrates Valentine’s Day by organizing a fair on its 8th floor.

And, this year, to mark the occasion, about fifty great French, English and Japanese chocolatiers have come together for the celebration of love.

This year’s fair will see 1 percent of the chocolate sales donated to two humanitarian associations, Otekomachi and International Plan, which work for the education of women in developing countries.

Other exhibitors have made similar moves. The chocolatier Noël Verde, for example, is very involved in fair trade by helping farmers in equatorial regions develop their cocoa production.

Love Cocoa, an English chocolatier, has proposed that a tree is planted for each purchase of chocolate.

Since 1950, Valentine’s Day in Japan has been the subject of huge marketing campaigns by major chocolate brands. But in Japan, it is the women who offer chocolates to the men on Valentine’s Day. The men are meant to reciprocate on White Day, March 14.

The Valentine’s Day chocolate fair is also popular with children and manga fans, including popular anime producer Kimetsu no Yai Ba, which created a booth with chocolates bearing the likenesses of popular anime characters.

But maybe times are changing. Traditionally, women in the workplace bring gifts of chocolate for their male colleagues. But according to a Job Research Institute cited in Sankei Biz, 84.6 percent of women said they would not do so, in part, at least, due to the increase in remote working.

Compared to before and after the pandemic, 42.6% said they would hand out chocolate in 2019. This dropped to 23.1% in 2020 and 16.9% in 2021, suggesting that the pandemic is taking the romance – and the chocolate – out of Valentine’s Day.