The US is buying up Japanese seafood to counter China's ban

The US military is helping Tokyo curb the economic fallout from China's ban on seafood products from Japan.

Right after Japan started releasing treated wastewater from the Fukushima nuclear plant in late August, China halted seafood exports from the country.

The US military stationed in Japan has started bulk-buying Japanese seafood to feed soldiers in messes and aboard vessels, and to sell in shops and restaurants on bases, Rahm Emanuel, US ambassador to the country, told Reuters in an interview yesterday.

Would China really keep a ban in place for four decades? And would the US keep coming to Japan's aid for all that time?

Quotable: China calls the US a troublemaker "The precautionary measures taken by China and some other countries in response to Japan's move to protect food safety and people's health are entirely legitimate, reasonable and necessary….As for the remarks of the US Ambassador to Japan, it needs to be pointed out that the duty of diplomats is to deepen friendship between countries, rather than smear other countries and sow discords.”

Japan's seafood exports to China, by the digits 100,000 tons: Volume of scallops that Japan exported to mainland China last year.

The US army in Japan has barely made a dent in that number, buying just "Shy of a metric ton of scallops" to start, Reuters reported.

20.7 billion yen: Value of an emergency fund that Japanese prime minister Fumio Kishida announced in early September to help exporters hit by China's ban on Japanese seafood.

64%: Share of seafood exports from the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido, known for scallop farming, that used to go to China.

Japanese scallops aren't just for consumption; their shells are removed in China before being exported to the US. Much Japanese seafood is typically sent to China to be processed and sold to the US and Europe, and even back to Japan.

11-27%: Price drop for Japanese scallops in the two months since China's ban.

Oct. 30, 2023: The US military starts buying Japanese seafood.