• Entrepreneurial Equity
  • Portfolio Investments
    • Current Investments
    • Historic Investments
  • Scribblings
    • Jane Taylor Book Launch
  • Fake News
  • Theology, Religion & Philosophy Corner
    • Does God Exist? The Rational Approach
    • What is the Evidence for Christianity?
    • What did Jesus Actually Teach? Only in His own Words
  • Linkedin
  • Twitter
  • Contact
  • Media Gallery
  • About Me
  • Home
  • Entrepreneurial Equity
  • Portfolio Investments
    • Current Investments
    • Historic Investments
  • Scribblings
    • Jane Taylor Book Launch
  • Fake News
  • Theology, Religion & Philosophy Corner
    • Does God Exist? The Rational Approach
    • What is the Evidence for Christianity?
    • What did Jesus Actually Teach? Only in His own Words

Blog Post

Japan, an Opportunity Awaits Us

11 Jun 2020
0 Comment
aurezza

I have been in the fish business for just over 30 years. There is no place more idolised as the centre of the world for those of us in fish, than the Tsukiji Fish Market. It is reputed to be the largest in the world. 700,000 tons of fish pass though there each year. 500 odd species totalling about $5bn dollars in value. A Bluefin Tuna sold there at the new site, in 2019 for a staggering $3.1m. There is no doubt that the Japanese love their fish. In fact, in Japan they consume 48.6 kg of seafood per capita per year. This is over double our 20 odd kg’s per year in the UK. In Japan, certain fish mongers have the same status as a sommelier does for wine. This is unique to Japan. I trade with the only one, resident outside of Japan, Nick Sakagami, Osakana Meister number 109. With Tuna, his palate is so sensitive, he can, by the smell & taste, tell you what ocean it is from & how it has been treated since its capture. These are unique skills, skills only found in Japan as far as I am aware.

The UK is a fishing nation. In 2019, UK exports of fish and shellfish to Japan totalled a miniscule £17.6 million, making up 0.2% of all UK goods exports to Japan. In 2019, Japan was the 14th largest destination for all UK fish and shellfish exports and the 5th largest non-EU destination. UK fish and shellfish exports to Japan made up 0.9% of all global UK fish and shellfish exports to the world in 2019. We can do better as a nation than that!

Mackerel is the 5th most popular fish in Japan and salmon, the most popular. The UK has a world class fishery in the former and a world class aquaculture industry in the latter. Cod is also popular. So why has trade not been more lucrative? Well, there are tariffs between the UK and Japan. Tariffs protect the local producers at the expense of their consumers and generally make food more expensive. We still come under the EU trading bloc, whose governance we are under, until the end of the year. Once these barriers are removed, we will be able to trade more. Although Atlantic Salmon is now free, Cod still remains at 9.1% and Mackerel at 9.4%. There will be opportunities with other species as well.

We export £1.3 bn of fish annually, nearly two thirds to Europe. The EU fleet catches nearly as much in UK territorial waters as the UK fleet does in its own waters, some 700,000 tons, the weight of all the fish sold in the top Japanese market I mentioned at the start of this article. With this injustice being corrected when we leave the final clutches of the EU at the end of the year, we will have a tremendous opportunity to a) catch more and b) sell more and c) more of that catch to new, or underserved markets.

With a UK/Japan Free Trade Agreement shortly to be in place, with the prospect of zero tariffs into the largest fish consumers in the world, our industry may well start to see some of that prosperity denied to us since our incorporation into the EU and the surrender of our sovereign waters to a foreign power, come back to us.

Toby Baxendale is an entrepreneur & investor see www.tobybaxendale.com

About the Author

Social Share

  • google-share

More Scribblings

Austrian Economics Podcast

22 Oct 2019

Economics for the Many

18 Oct 2018

What is Right Wing?

06 Nov 2017

The Protectionist Zombie Is Back

19 Jul 2017

Brexit Podcast

16 Jun 2017

Liberty Me

20 Dec 2013

My Time for Speakers for Schools

07 Dec 2013

The Selfish Gene, its Extended Phenotypic Effects and Human Cooperation

19 Aug 2013

In Defense of the Euro (An Austrian Perspective)

15 Aug 2013

IM70.3 Mallorca - The Chairman's report

13 May 2013

AEP and “The Chicago Plan Revisited

18 Jan 2013

Ron Paul’s Monetary Policy Anthology

08 Jan 2013

Exorcising the Ghost of Ironman Zurich

14 Nov 2012

Communist Approval For Western Central Banking

28 Sep 2012

The Motive Powers Of Destructionism

19 Sep 2012

The Hope Of Osborne And The Error Of Osborne

14 Sep 2012

The Ultimate Subsidy For The Rich

03 Sep 2012

Gross And Net Product

30 Aug 2012

Did The Savings Glut Or Massive Monetary Epansion Cause The Boom And The Bust?

13 Aug 2012

Forward To Liberalism

29 Jul 2012

Hugh Hendry v. Joseph Stiglitz

18 Jul 2012

Fraud - Documentary

13 Jul 2012

A Great Teacher

13 Jul 2012

Fraud

13 Jul 2012

Our Central Bankers Are intellectually Bankrupt

09 May 2012

From Nuts To Paul Krugman

08 May 2012

Tag Cloud

Austrian School Bank of England Banking Benjamin M. Anderson Economics F A Hayek Fractional Reserve Banking Fraud gold Hayek Hayek Lecture 2010 Henry Hazlitt Honest Money Huerta de Soto inflation Insight Jean Baptiste Say Ken Schoolland Keynes Keynesianism MIses Monetarism Quantitative Easing Richard Cobden Sean Corrigan
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Proudly built by Lemongrass Media - Web Design Hertfordshire