July 26, 2013

In order to meet the domestic market's growing demand, Japan has explored the use of new mass-production technology and the import of fry with which eel escalating prices are attempted to be halted, but has not proved successful so far.

A laboratory in Minami-Ise in the Mie Prefecture is conducting research on the cultivation of fresh water eel at a large scale, supervised by the Fisheries Research Agency in Yokohama, The Yomiuri Shimbun reports.

If this new technology succeeds, it will mean a considerable fall in its domestic market price, where most of the eel is cultivated. The objective is to develop full cultivation, from egg production to adult fish. In this way, it is intended to avoid depending on natural fry supply (like in the case of the traditional fattening methods) and be able to stabilise the eel supply production in the country.

The idea is that farmers raise natural eggs to adult fish, which are then allowed to spawn. The spawned eggs are first raised to elvers, then to adult eels at a farm. The research agency first succeeded in full cultivation in 2010, and now it aims at developing the capacity to produce about 10,000 elvers a year by fiscal 2016.

However, this process can be very difficult as artificial breeding can be really delicate. Several methods are being tested, which include a special kind of feed development that does not pollute the water.

Meanwhile, some firms have also been importing a different species of eel from Indonesia and the Philippines, the bicolour eel (Anguilla bicolor bicolor) to meet local demand. When cooked in the traditional way of kabayaki-broiled and is coated in a soy-based sauce, it becomes indistinguishable from the Japanese eel (Anguilla japonica). Farmers are hoping to eventually be able to cultivate this species in Japan.

Only gradually will these methods produce eels in volumes large enough to satisfy domestic demand. Since these initiatives have only just begun, the eel industry is still in a critical stage. Neither is meant as an immediate answer to the problem, rather long-term ones.

Last February, the Japanese Environment Ministry included the Japanese eel to the endangered category of its Red List. As a consequence, international eel trade might be banned. With Japanese importers unable to commercialise elvers this will mean the prices will escalate even more. Eel is very popular in Japan where unagi-ya restaurants (specialising in freshwater eel) use it in a variety of dishes.

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