For the first time since Japan's worst nuclear crisis in March last year, seafood caught off the coast of Fukushima went on trial sale on Monday at supermarkets in northeastern Japan prefecture. At supermarkets and retail stores in Soma city, Octopus and whelks caught off the coast of Fukushima were put on the trial sale.
A local fisheries cooperative said no radioactive substances were detected in the seafood caught during Friday's trial fishing in waters more than 150 meters deep and 50 kilometers off the coast of Soma. The products were boiled before being shipped to the local retailers and also to seafood markets elsewhere in the prefectures such as in Iwaki and Koriyama cities.
In Monday's sales, two kinds of octopus and one of whelks hit the store shelves. A supermarket in Soma sold them about 40 per cent cheaper than usual market prices.
The Fukushima Prefectural Federation of Fisheries Cooperative Associations said the trial sale is aimed at gauging demand and market values of the three species chosen for low levels or none of radioactive contamination during monitoring of 163 marine species from April last year through this June.
The local fishing industry suffered a major blow from the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami and ensuing nuclear crisis at Tokyo Electric Power Co.'s Fukushima Daiichi power plant, with its annual sales plunging to about 1.63 billion yen in 2011 from about 10.96 billion yen in 2010 as it has suspended operations since the disaster.
The association plans to expand sales of Fukushima seafood to outside the prefecture after another trial fishing session scheduled on Wednesday.
"I was determined to buy (the seafood) on Monday. We must give help to the local industry. I will eat them as sashimi," said 63-year-old Mitsuru Tokura who bought two packs of octopus.(Kyodo)