AFP, Saitama :
Japan may be an island nation surrounded by the bounty of the sea, but businessman Tetsuro Sogo is looking inland to raise one of the country’s most loved sushi fish: salmon.
In a mountainous area near Tokyo, the water in a tank is a murk of writhing grey salmon, slithering past each other as they angle for food.
They are part of an experiment that Sogo, chief operating officer at FRD Japan, hopes will one day allow cost-effective inland farming of salmon, and enable Japanese to buy the homegrown fish for their sushi.
“We’ll be able to easily get quality salmon wherever we are,” Sogo told AFP.
The majority of the salmon consumed worldwide is farmed, not wild, and the aquaculture market is dominated by Norway, which produces 1.3 million tonnes a year.
But farming at sea, the most common way to produce the fish, is a complicated prospect: the sea must be the right temperature-colder than 20 degrees Celsius (68 Fahrenheit) — and only areas without strong waves and currents are suitable, normally inlets or bays.
Inland farming of salmon is often an impractical, expensive endeavour requiring lots of water and electricity to keep tanks clean.
That hasn’t stopped demand exploding since the 1980s, with the United States, Russia, Europe and Japan all clamouring for the fish’s rich pink flesh, according to the World Wildlife Fund.
“Supply is not catching up with the growing demand,” said Sogo, speaking at his test facility in Saitama, 50 kilometres (31 miles) from the sea.
Dressed in a suit like a typical Japanese salaryman, except for a pair of white rubber boots, Sogo carefully monitors the fish as though he is watching his own children.
He explained: “We thought we needed a new way to produce more salmon.”
The company’s process is two-fold: first, simple tap water is converted to seawater by adding artificial sea salt, which allows the farming process to be set up anywhere tap water is available.
Second, a patented technology involving bacteria cleans the water, consuming the ammonia produced by the fish, and dissolving nitric acid, meaning energy-sucking cleaning systems are not necessary.
“We’ll be the world’s first successful case for this type of land-based salmon farming if we can turn a profit,” Sogo said.
The process was born out of technology developed by Sogo’s company for sewage disposal systems.
In 2008, they developed the breakthrough bacteria technology and the following year it was being used at an aquarium in Tokyo, at which point Sogo realised it could be used for salmon farming.
Japan may be an island nation surrounded by the bounty of the sea, but businessman Tetsuro Sogo is looking inland to raise one of the country’s most loved sushi fish: salmon.
In a mountainous area near Tokyo, the water in a tank is a murk of writhing grey salmon, slithering past each other as they angle for food.
They are part of an experiment that Sogo, chief operating officer at FRD Japan, hopes will one day allow cost-effective inland farming of salmon, and enable Japanese to buy the homegrown fish for their sushi.
“We’ll be able to easily get quality salmon wherever we are,” Sogo told AFP.
The majority of the salmon consumed worldwide is farmed, not wild, and the aquaculture market is dominated by Norway, which produces 1.3 million tonnes a year.
But farming at sea, the most common way to produce the fish, is a complicated prospect: the sea must be the right temperature-colder than 20 degrees Celsius (68 Fahrenheit) — and only areas without strong waves and currents are suitable, normally inlets or bays.
Inland farming of salmon is often an impractical, expensive endeavour requiring lots of water and electricity to keep tanks clean.
That hasn’t stopped demand exploding since the 1980s, with the United States, Russia, Europe and Japan all clamouring for the fish’s rich pink flesh, according to the World Wildlife Fund.
“Supply is not catching up with the growing demand,” said Sogo, speaking at his test facility in Saitama, 50 kilometres (31 miles) from the sea.
Dressed in a suit like a typical Japanese salaryman, except for a pair of white rubber boots, Sogo carefully monitors the fish as though he is watching his own children.
He explained: “We thought we needed a new way to produce more salmon.”
The company’s process is two-fold: first, simple tap water is converted to seawater by adding artificial sea salt, which allows the farming process to be set up anywhere tap water is available.
Second, a patented technology involving bacteria cleans the water, consuming the ammonia produced by the fish, and dissolving nitric acid, meaning energy-sucking cleaning systems are not necessary.
“We’ll be the world’s first successful case for this type of land-based salmon farming if we can turn a profit,” Sogo said.
The process was born out of technology developed by Sogo’s company for sewage disposal systems.
In 2008, they developed the breakthrough bacteria technology and the following year it was being used at an aquarium in Tokyo, at which point Sogo realised it could be used for salmon farming.
