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Fish Evangelist Ueda Katsuhiko Singing the Praises of Seafood in Bid to Boost Consumption
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Record Tuna Auctions amid Falling Fish Consumption
The New Year tuna auction at Toyosu Market, Tokyo’s main wholesale location for fresh seafood, has become a lively tradition. This year’s auction on January 5 saw a 276-kilogram tuna from Ōma, Aomori, sell for ¥207 million, the second highest amount after a bluefin tuna went for ¥333.6 million in 2019. The winning bid again came from major wholesaler Yamayuki and the Onodera Group, who partnered for the fifth year in a row to secure the highest-priced tuna. The bluefin was served at the sushi shop Ginza Onodera and other outlets run by the Onodera Group.
The first tuna of 2025 is presented to the media prior to auction. (© Kawamoto Daigo)
Toyosu Market’s first seafood auction also saw a 350-gram tray of green sea urchin (bafun uni) from Hokkaidō go for a record ¥7 million. Such extravagance, however, does not mean that prospects for Japan’s fisheries industry are rosy.
Catches of staple seafood types like Pacific saury, salmon, and Japanese common squid have all declined in recent years. While high-end products like bluefin tuna and sea urchin, delicacies that feature prominently on sushi menus, cause a stir, other types of seafood traditionally consumed at home are declining as fish overall fades from the nation’s dinner tables. Japan’s diverse seafood cuisine is in clear decline, with Japan’s fishing harbors, fish markets, and fishermen taking the blow.
Green sea urchin sells for ¥20,000 per gram, a price more valuable than gold. (© Kawamoto Daigo)
Seasonal Fish Catches Cratering
The poster child for sinking catches is the Pacific saury, a long-time autumn staple in Japan. While catches have rebounded from the record low of 17,910 tons in 2022, the increase has been modest, with fishing fleets in 2023 and 2024 netting only a tenth of the record high 343,000 tons landed in 2008. This has driven up prices. Not so long ago, a plump saury could be had for less than ¥100, but recently even scrawny fish go for over ¥200.
The catch of domestic salmon, centered on Hokkaidō, has seen even greater drops. With imports from Chile and Norway ever more present on the market, there is no shortage of salmon on store shelves. However, the roe from imported fish is not suited for processing into products like ikura, a favorite sushi topping, or sujiko, the name for salted eggs still in their casing, and the continued fall in domestic salmon supplies is pushing prices up.
Many of the saury caught this season were small in size. (© Kawamoto Daigo)
Ikura prices have risen as domestic salmon catches dwindle. (© Kawamoto Daigo)
Catches of common squid (surume ika) have also fallen to record-low levels. Much like Pacific saury, hauls are only a tenth of what they were 20 years ago, resulting in higher prices. A single squid could once be had at a supermarket for as little as ¥100, but no longer. Today, squid sashimi offered at a neighborhood izakaya, is often made from more abundant and less spendy varieties like red squid.
Kotani Kazuhiko, who spent 40 years as a buyer for a major supermarket chain, frets over the situation, asserting that “the fall in catches of staple seafood varieties is driving down fish consumption.” Kotani now works as an advisor focused on reversing this trend. “Consumers hold off making purchases if they feel quality doesn’t match price, expecting that something better and more affordable will become available. It’s in this period of hesitation that the custom of eating fish fades.” If this trend continues, younger generations will lose access to shared traditions, like the taste of saury in autumn.
Saury grilled with salt, a seasonal treat that is disappearing from Japan’s dinner tables. (© Pixta)
A Recurring Problem
This departure from eating seafood is not a recent phenomenon. According to annual reports on consumption by the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries, the per capita consumption of seafood peaked in 2001 at 40.2 kilograms and has dropped each year, shrinking to 21.4 kilograms in 2023. That is the same level seen roughly 50 years ago.
Meat consumption, on the other hand, continues to rise steadily. In 2011 it surpassed fish, and the gap continues to widen. Japan’s move away from fish goes against the global trend in seafood consumption, which according to the Fisheries Agency has doubled over the last half century and shows no sign of slowing down.
Cooking Concerns
Why is fish losing its appeal? A 2019 opinion survey by the MAFF provides some insight, with participants choosing “My family wants to eat meat,” “It’s expensive,” and “It’s too much trouble to cook” among top answers. These responses come even as the public grows more aware of the healthful nutrients contained in seafood, compounds like EPA and DHA. However, MAFF notes that this is not leading to increased consumption of fish.
This is not to say that more people dislike eating fish than before. The Japan Fisheries Association ran a 2022 survey on trends in consumption and preferences among children of different ages and found that 74.8% of respondents said their families likes to eat seafood. However, this dropped to only 30.2% when it came to the question of cooking fish at home, suggesting the difficulty in preparing seafood could be contributing to the decline.
It is worth noting that 86.7% respondents said that they like to eat meat, and 50.4% said they like to cook meat, showing a significant gap with seafood.
Staff at the seafood shop Sakanaya Marukama in the Kitakamakura neighborhood will clean and dress fish for customers. (© Nippon.com)
Turning the Tide
Ueda Katsuhiko, a former Fisheries Agency official turned “fish evangelist,” sees the focus on the difficulties of preparation and other general misunderstandings as drivers for fading fish consumption.
Ueda points to six reasons for people’s hesitation to cook fish: time and effort involved, the odor of seafood, waste parts, not knowing recipes, aversion to bones, and meat being seen as more affordable. The Ueda Method of evangelism focuses on demonstrating how to skillfully prepare fish and introducing easy-to-make recipes. “If we can turn those preconceptions around,” declares Ueda, “people will become immediate fans.”
Ueda Katsuhiko at Sakanaya Marukama. (© Nippon.com)
Ueda offered his proof of concept at a cooking workshop at Toyosu Market in August 2024 where he showed some 30 parents and children how to turn a whole Japanese jack mackerel into a meal. Participants sat and watched mesmerized as Ueda cleaned the fish, skillfully cut a portion into sashimi, and then used the offal to make a stew.
The attendees then tried their hands at preparing the same dishes. At the end of the workshop, comments flooded in, with one parent exclaiming, “My son doesn’t even like fish, but he happily wolfed everything down saying how delicious it was.” Another commented, “I think we’ll be eating more seafood at home.” One child declared with a beaming smile, “It was so easy!”
Ueda Katsuhiko, chef’s knife in hand, speaks intently to his audience. (© Kawamoto Daigo)
Sharing the Diversity of Japan’s Fish Cuisine
Several times a month, Ueda shows up at Sakanaya Marukama, a seafood shop in Kanagawa’s Kitakamakura area, to interact with customers. During each visit he shares a new way to prepare and eat fish, making sure to focus on the process rather than merely introducing recipes.
“When you clean a fish, where and how you cut influences the flavor,” Ueda proclaims. “You can’t just be concerned with making it quick and easy. Each seasoning has its role and timing for when it should be added. Like with stewed fish, if you add salt or soy sauce first, the fish will become tough. But if you start with sake or sugar and then stew it, you’ll get a fluffier texture.” Understanding how to prepare seafood allows home chefs to make the most of what they have by preparing dishes quickly and with less waste, which means fewer unpleasant smells in the kitchen and a better sense of value for money spent.
Ueda outside Sakanaya Marukama. (© Nippon.com)
Ueda understands that the prospects for boosting fish consumption face an uphill struggle. Even with abundant catches of sardines and Pacific chub mackerel offering shoppers a steady supply of tasty and inexpensive seafood options, there is no indication that the needle on consumption has been pushed into the black. “The fishing industry must take stock of the current situation and work to address its shortcomings,” insists Ueda. “It’s not glamorous work, but it’s important and should be done in all earnestness.”
Befitting his slogan, “Revitalizing Japan through seafood,” Ueda says that he wants people to gain a sense of the diversity of seafood in Japan. “The fish we eat in Japan is immensely varied, with each region and even port boasting their own specialties and preparation methods. I hope visitors to Japan don’t just eat sushi, but try fish dishes full of local flavor, and even learn to prepare them, if they can.”
Things learned by study alone may soon be forgotten, but Ueda asserts that “with good food, the tastes and textures stay with us for life.” Enjoying Japan’s abundant fish varieties and learning about the diverse ways of preparing seafood will not only help preserve Japanese seafood culture but will benefit society by enriching people’s lives.
Ueda Katsuhiko cleans a locally caught fish. (© Nippon.com)
(Originally published in Japanese. Banner photo: Traditional fishmonger Ueda Katsuhiko shows off his skill in cleaning and preparing fish. © Nippon.com.)