Tokyo Fish Market: A Crystal Ball for Seafood's Future

By jjacquet on August 26, 2009.

"Shrinking fish size at Tsukiji sign of trouble; Japan rethinking need for fish management at home" -- this is the headline of a recent article at seafood.com. Tsukiji is the world's largest fish market. Located in Tokyo, Japan, it spans 43 football fields and feeds the nation's seafood demand (you can see Tsukijii in the 60-Minute coverage of the tuna crisis made last year). Since most of us cannot access the article, I wanted to point out a paragraph that shows the trend of seafood with all the clairvoyance (but none of the skepticism) of a crystal ball:

Yet if you look closely, Tsukiji is showing the strain. Sales measured by weight are down by about a quarter from a decade ago. Many of the fish aren't wild, but from fish farms in Morocco, Spain, Australia and Vietnam. Some species now run much smaller and thinner. Buyers and sellers concede: Many fish sold at Tsukiji don't taste quite as good, as rich, as they once did.

p.s. Thank you to Mike Hirshfield at Oceana for sending along today's two stories.

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Seafood

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I don't understand your crystal ball analogy? There was just an analysis of fisheries world-wide published in science... why would you want a crystal ball when you have empirical data published in Science?

Last comment... the source of this article was the EDITORIAL section of the online Oregon Live news website.