Column: Various styles for tuna and skipjack fishery

- Tunas and skipjacks, which are highly migratory fish species, are distributed widely in oceans around the world. The tunas and skipjacks can be caught not only in waters surrounding Japan, but in waters around the world. Thus, Japanese fishing vessels are operating in various sea areas.

- Bluefin tuna that migrate to waters surrounding Japan are caught by trolling or by purse seine.

- Tunas and skipjacks are mainly caught by far-seas fishery, which was used for catching 60% of all tunas and 70% of skipjacks harvested in 2011.

- Far-seas tuna and skipjack fisheries can roughly be divided into long-line fishery and purse seine fishery. Long-line fishery is carried out by fishing vessels equipped with ultra-low-temperature refrigerators which sail out to western central Pacific, Indian Ocean, Atlantic Ocean, etc. in pursuit of tuna for sashimi.

- Purse seine fishery, also referred to as far-seas purse seine fishery, catches skipjack to be frozen to be made into dried skipjack mainly in western central Pacific.

Far-seas purse seine fishery supplying 60% (about 200,000 tons) of skipjack to be used for dried skipjack products in Japan

## (Trends in the number of fishery workers and securing of new recruits)

- In 2011, fishery workers (excluding Iwate, Miyagi, and Fukushima Prefectures) comprised 178,000 people (3.4% fall from the previous year), 36.1% of whom were aged 65 or older (0.4% increase from the previous year).

- Licensed mariners, who are needed for ensuring safe fishery operations in Japan, are becoming older, and it is an important challenge to secure such people in fishery business management.

- The number of new recruits nationwide was 1,776 in 2011. In order to secure new recruits and successors in the fishery and aquaculture industries, the government supports efforts including the holding of fishery employment consultation events and long-term on-site training.

- In FY2013, the government launched a project to provide funds to young people who are studying at fishery schools with the aim of becoming fishery workers.

## Changes in the number of fishery workers

Source: MAFF, Census of Fisheries and Report on the Survey of Fishing Industry Employment Trends.

Excluding Iwate, Miyagi, and Fukushima Prefectures

Note: Figures in parentheses are percentages of the total number of fishery workers.

## Column: Fisheries high schools contributing to developing human resources for the fishing industry

- Fishery courses are available at 46 high schools in 36 prefectures. The number of students was 9,612 in FY2012. Among those who graduated in March 2011, 40% became fishery or maritime-related workers, excluding those pursuing further education.

- Fisheries high schools offer a broad range of fishery and maritime-related curriculums, including courses for acquiring qualifications to become a navigation officer or an engineer who serves as executive crew on fishing vessels, courses for studying maritime environment, aquatic organisms, and fish farming, and courses for learning about fishery processing.

- Many graduates have also been hired by companies in the food industry and other non-fishery industries. Recently, there has been an increase in the percentage of female students.

Catching billfish in on-board training of long-line fishery (a fisheries high school in Shimane Prefecture)

## (Women supporting the fishing industry and contributing to revitalizing the community)

- Women in fishing communities play particularly important roles in fishery-related operations on land and fishery-processing plants. Also, women from fishery households contribute to revitalizing fisheries and fishing communities through wide-ranging activities, such as increasing the added values of fish and fishery products.