Inside Tokyo’s Tsukiji Market: The World’s Biggest Fish Market

Sandwiched betwixt Sumida River as well as the upmarket Ginza shopping district , inwards Tsukiji inwards key Tokyo , is a large wholesale marketplace pose for fruits , vegetables , flowers as well as marrow , but it’s fish as well as seafood for which Tsukiji is most famous for. Everyday nearly two ,000 metric tons of seafood passes through the marketplace pose everyday. It is the biggest wholesale fish as well as seafood marketplace pose inwards the populace as well as also 1 of the largest wholesale nutrient markets of whatsoever kind.

Tokyo’s earliest fish marketplace pose , named Uogashi , was established on the banking venture of Nihonbashi River during the 16th century every bit a house to sell leftover fish that were non bought past times the Edo Castle , the regal residence of the shogun. At that fourth dimension , Tokyo was known past times its one-time advert Edo. As the metropolis grew , as well as thus did Uogashi until it developed into a large-scale wholesale market.

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Photo credit: Stewart Butterfield/Flickr

After the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake devastated much of key Tokyo , including the Nihonbashi fish marketplace pose , the marketplace pose was relocated to the Tsukiji district. It began operating inwards 1935 , as well as has since cash inwards one's chips 1 of the most pop tourist destinations inwards the city. The most famous is the tuna auction where contest tin campaign prices upwards of several K dollars for a unmarried fish. In 2013 , a 489-pound bluefin tuna was sold for a a mind-boggling $1.76 million.

The auction takes house inwards the “inner market” where alone licensed wholesale dealers operate. Visitors root lining upward at three inwards the forenoon to live on 1 of the lucky few who are allowed to run into the auction every day. The “outer market” is opened upward to all as well as is a mixture of wholesale as well as retail shops that sell Japanese kitchen tools , eating theatre supplies , groceries , as well as seafood , as well as many restaurants.

The auction begins at nearly 5:30 AM as well as ends at 10 AM. After the fish is purchased it is cutting as well as prepared for retail inwards 1 of the many shops within the market. For large fish similar tuna , it is an elaborate process. Frozen tuna as well as swordfish are oftentimes cutting alongside large band saws , as well as fresh tuna is carved alongside extremely long knives but about good over a meter inwards length.

The Tsukiji fish marketplace pose handles to a greater extent than than 400 dissimilar types of seafood from inexpensive seaweed to the most expensive caviar , as well as from tiny sardines to 300 kg tuna as well as fifty-fifty controversial whale species. About 700 ,000 metric tons of seafood worth 5.9 billion the US dollars are sold hither every year.

Later this twelvemonth , the Tsukiji marketplace pose volition live on moved to a novel finish on Tokyo Bay , to reclaim valuable existent estate inwards Tsukiji. The metropolis plans to lay a route through this expanse every bit japan prepares Tokyo for the 2020 Olympics.

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