| Women Respond to Consumers' Aversion to Fish |
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Given its close proximity to the Bungo Channel, Tsurumi has a thriving seine fishing industry and has one of the largest landing volumes in the prefecture. Mackerel, horse mackerel and sardines are most often caught. Every morning, when our husbands and oldest sons return on their boats, we-being the fishermen's wives-must start our job of sorting the fish and preparing meals for the day.
One day when we were busy sorting
fish, we got into the conversation about how lucky we are to eat such fresh fish
every single day. In recent years, low prices are a problem for fishermen, but
consumers' reluctance to eat fish is also a serious problem. Fresh caught fish
are so delicious, so it makes us wonder if people elsewhere have ever had fresh
fish. We wished they would eat more. This thought prevailed, leading us to band
together and decide to market our fish directly to other regions in the prefecture.
Fishermen's wives are busy bees. But they currently face the problem of having no place to work. I desperately wanted to set up a space where women could work easily and enjoyably. With this desire providing impetus, I founded Mebaru in 2004 and from there our activities officially started. |
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| There are many seiner vessels (boats equipped with vertical wrap-around nets for fishing) in Tsurumi. |
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| Categorizing the fish takes about two to three hours. |
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| Human Interaction through Traveling Sales and Food Education |
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About five times per month, we load a truck with live fish and drive to morning markets throughout the prefecture to sell mackerel, horse mackerel and other fish. Customers see fish swimming in the tank and anytime they say, "I want this one," we scoop it out, kill it and hand it over on the spot. Customers can see with their own eyes how fresh they are, so this method has a good reputation.
Nevertheless, before we arrived at this method of selling there was much trial and error. After all, it was our first time doing traveling sales, and in the beginning sometimes fish died before we could arrive at the location. We pooled ideas among ourselves to solve the problems, slowly making improvements, eventually settling on our current way of doing things.
Recently we've been traveling to morning markets in Bungo Ono, Ogata, Mie, and Oita City, and have enjoyed chatting with customers. Different fish are popular depending on the town. Also surprising is that, when we give advice on cooking methods or what is in season, there are many who don't know much, even among older people. We're discovering first-hand that still not much is known about fish.
Nowadays, as a female member of the fishing cooperative union, I go to local elementary and junior high schools and teach children about fish. What I teach is a bit different than general education, which focuses on balanced nutrition or table manners. While teaching the basic preparation technique of separating a fish into three filets, I show the children the fish's blood, bones, and organs, and hope to get them to understand that we humans are able to continue living because we receive the fish's life.
Also, while the children are still young I want them to remember the taste of Tsurumi's fish, so when they become adults they can say to themselves, "That fish I had so long ago was delicious. I love Tsurumi." It would make me very happy if, through their fish experience, they would think of Tsurumi with pride. |
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| Selling live fish from tanks on the back of a truck during the early days of the business. |
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| Telling customers about how fishermen's wives prepare and cook fish. |
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| Spreading Unique Fishing Village Cooking to All Japan |
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In March, 2008, we built a food processing shop in order to put energy into selling goods that can be easily eaten in any household. Here at the processing shop we make various foods, from Saiki City's traditional flavor, gomadashi (a mixture of minced fish and ground sesame seed, flavored with soy sauce and mirin), to dried fish and sushi. Gomadashi udon is an another easy meal that fishermen in Saiki often eat, made by pouring hot water on udon noodles topped with gomadashi. I naturally learned to make this by watching my parents make it over and over since I was a child, and now I make it with fresh fish caught that day. Our company was able to package gomadashi and now we sell it to department stores and over the internet. Also, to promote our products I have traveled to Tokyo and Fukuoka.
Our future goals include plans to familiarize people with not only fish but also gomadashi. We, the women of fishing villages, know more than anyone about local food that is passed on through the generations of fishing families. For this very reason, we want to propagate Japan's original fish-eating culture by bridging the gap between us and consumers everywhere. |
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| "Saiki's Gomadashi Udon," chosen by the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries in its "Top 100 List of Traditional Rural Food." |
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| Some members of Mebaru, the Fishing Village Women's Group |
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