【Roman Huber】

As far as fruit packaging goes,Roman Huber this is perhaps the least Earth-friendly one by far.

A Hong Kong supermarket has come under fire from shoppers for carrying an elaborately packed single strawberry from Japan.

The strawberry, sold by the upscale CitySuper, is packaged in a box, nestled in a straw nest and fruit sock within. Its price tag? HKD $168 ($21.60).

The uproar started over the weekend, when a picture of the fruit was posted on Facebook.

It soon started making its way round social media.

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CitySuper says that the strawberry was packaged this way by the Japanese supplier as a Valentine's Day gift idea.

"The strawberry gift box was imported from Japan with its original packaging given its premium grade, rarity, and fragility for quality protection," a spokesperson for the supermarket told the Hong Kong Free Press.

The supermarket said that the strawberry's high price was due to its cost price, logistical costs, market conditions and product exclusivity.

The strawberry was air-flown from the city of Nara, Japan, and has been billed as a "rare" fruit with "good acidity and rich sweetness".

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The uproar about the box comes amidst a petition by environmentalists in Hong Kong calling for less plastic packaging by supermarkets. The petition was launched in January and now has 7,917 signatures.

Environmentalists have also started a campaign, #trashthecheckout, to pressure the city's supermarkets to reduce plastic packaging by removing plastic packaging from fruits and vegetables and leaving it at checkout counters:

Gary Stokes, who started the campaign, wrote in his Facebook post: "If everyone starts to #trashthecheckout then we can only hope that the supermarkets will start listening and begin to source their produce responsibly."

Stokes, who is also Asia director for the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, told the South China Morning Postthat the "heavily packaged strawberry" reminded him "of something out of Mad Max-- like it's the last strawberry on Earth."

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