A scallop is grilled in this file photo taken in Wakkanai, Hokkaido, in July 2022. Hokkaido scallops are popular in China. (Mainichi/Shuhei Endo)
People in Japan’s fisheries industry expressed shock and disappointment Nov. 19 after learning Beijing had notified Japan it will suspend the acceptance of applications for importing Japanese seafood.
China had only recently lifted its total ban on Japanese seafood, which had been in place since August 2023, following the release of treated water from Tokyo Electric Power Co. Holdings Inc.’s Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station into the ocean, and exports of Japanese scallops to China had resumed Nov. 5.
Kyuichi Co., a seafood processing company in Hakodate, Hokkaido, that specializes in scallops, said that China-bound products had previously accounted for a quarter of its sales. During the first ban, the firm worked to develop markets domestically and in other countries beyond China. But still, company president Tatsuhiko Etori commented, “I was surprised. We were finally at the stage of advancing procedures to resume exports to China, so this is very disappointing.”
One seafood processing company on the Okhotsk coast, where scallop fishing is thriving, had taken measures such as boosting exports to the United States. The company president commented, “We were thinking of not relying on China anymore, so we’re not worried. It probably won’t have a large impact.”
Isamu Takayashiki, general manager or the Yokohama-machi fisheries cooperative in the Aomori Prefecture town of Yokohama, which had exported sea cucumbers to China, said, “We’d just taken a step forward, thinking now is the time. It’s a shame that exports have been halted so soon after they resumed.”
(Japanese original by Kunihiko Misawa, Hakodate Bureau; Takeshi Honda, Kitami Bureau; and Takashi Yonee, Tokyo City News Department)
AloJapan.com