THE UNKNOWN STRONG AND WASTE -FREE

FISHING INDUSTRY
OF IWATE

Left: Iwate University Assoc. Professor ISHIMURA Gakushi (center), Musashi University Assoc.
Professor ABE Keita (right), and KANAZAWA Kaito (left), a graduate student who comes from aMiyako fishing family and who studies under Ishimura. All three men conduct research on theSanriku Coast’s fishing industry.
Right: SUZUKI Ryota, the “Squid Prince.” He says, “My efforts are gradually gaining recognition.
Recently, they’ve been attracting interest from students who will work in fisheries in the future.
That makes me so happy.”
MiyakoIt has been almost 12 years since the Great East Japan Earthquake. The fishing industry
in the city of Miyako in Iwate Prefecture reopened just a month after the disaster,
helping to fuel the reconstruction effort. We explored the nature and background of
the strength of Miyako’s fishing industry, which has driven the area’s revival.
The waters off Sanriku, theeastern coast of the Tohoku(northeastern Japan) region—
where cold and warm ocean
currents collide—are home
to one of the world’s threegreat fisheries, featuring animmense variety of sea life. Thecomplex coastline calms thewaves, making it suitable foraquaculture, and the plentiful
gifts of the sea support thelivelihoods of the local people.
In March 2011, the Great East
Japan Earthquake struck the area.
IDOBATA Katsuji—a memberof the fisheries association inMiyako City, Iwate Prefecture,
which forms part of the Sanriku

Coast—describes his experienceof the disaster as follows: “Thetsunami inundated Miyako’s fish
market, almost up to the roof.
All our utilities, including waterand electricity, were cut off.”
Even so, Miyako’s fishingindustry reopened that April,just a month after the calamity.
KANAZAWA Toshiaki, director
chairman of the Iwate Prefecture
Bottom Trawl Fishery Association,says, “When the quake hit, wewere in the middle of unloadinga catch at the port. That’s why
we could quickly escape inour boats offshore before thetsunami arrived, saving both ourcrew and our boats.” The trucks

and forklifts used at the market
were also safe because the workers
had quickly moved them to highground.
Another notable reason for thelocal fishing industry’s prompt
recovery has been the use of the
traditional method of trawling—catching multiple marine species
rather than intensive fishing of thefew species that are in demand—
which had been in practice sincewell before the earthquake.
ISHIMURA Gakushi, Associate
Professor of resource economics
at the Iwate University Faculty ofAgriculture, says, “In Japan, which
has four distinct seasons, andwhose geography is characterizedby multiple inlets where different
currents run up against eachother, the ocean environment ofcoastal fisheries and the species
composition of the catch changes
easily. That is why Japan, compared
A trawler pulls in a catch afterdragging a net through the ocean. The
crew quickly sorts the many kinds offish and shellfish once unloaded.

with other countries, hasdeveloped a culinary culture thatutilizes an extremely wide varietyof marine species.” Catching many
species together, rather than justtargeting the one or the few with ahigh market value, is a method that
commonly leads to a significant lossof catch in other countries because
only a limited variety of seafood isever in high demand. In contrast,
when Japanese fishers using theirunique trawling and set nets catcha variety of marine species at once,
none of the catch goes to waste. It
all becomes food and avoids thenegative effects of intensive fishingof a limited number of species.
Ishimura showed that thediversification of species in eachcatch has contributed to thestability of the coastal fishingbusiness. Distributing investments
among multiple assets to minimize
risk while sustaining returns is awell-known financial engineering
theory of portfolio management,
and the same thinking applies
to fishing as well. Ishimura
explains, “Seafood brokers aregood at adapting to fluctuationsin the kinds and quantities offish and other sea life that arecaught. The local wholesalersin Miyako distribute multiple
species to areas where they canfetch a higher price in various
ways, such as through being

processed as seafood products
or supplied to the market for
fresh raw consumption. In otherwords, prices are maintained byadding diverse economic values
to the variety of seafood products.
Miyako is an important location
thanks to transportation links
that connect the coast with theprefectural capital of Morioka
inland. That situation has
particularly matured the seafood
supply chain, and that, I believe,
is what contributed to the rapid
recovery of the value of landings
so soon after the earthquake.”
One person who has been
instrumental in expanding sales
channels for Miyako’s seafood
since the earthquake is SUZUKI
Ryota, the representative director
and executive managing directorof Kyowa Suisan, a seafood
processing company in Miyako.
He says, “When I saw how muchthe earthquake had changed
the familiar city and market, I
thought that I had to initiate
some sort of action.” After thedisaster, he started presenting
himself as the “Squid Prince,”
sharing information through ablog and various media platforms,and opening up new sales
channels through events and theInternet. Suzuki’s ideas for thinly
sliced squid somen-style noodles
in a cup and fried cod became

hit products. Meanwhile, Kyowa
Suisan and three other companies
in the industry started up Miyako
Team Isaribi (isaribi referringto the torch used for attracting
fish during night fishing). Eachmember of the group takes careof different processes, fromprocurement to production, sales,and transactions, while sharing
raw ingredients and sales channels.
The result has been a tripling ofsales compared with the situation
before the earthquake.
With demand for food risingworldwide as the global population
increases, the sustainable use ofocean resources has become anissue of international importancethat has also been addressed by theUnited Nations’ SDGs. Miyako’s
fishing industry, which forms thefoundation of the local economy,
employs fishing methods anddistribution systems that have heldup against changes to the naturalenvironment and resources. That
could be an important tool for
considering ways of using theworld’s ocean resources and theeconomic activity they entail.
Top: An auction at Miyako’s fish market.
Seafood brokers gather to place bids on thefish and shellfish.
Bottom: Miyako’s fish market at the time of
the 2011 earthquake. The market was flooded
to the roof by the tsunami.