Program

We investigated whether the 2011 spill of radioactive materials from the Fukushima nuclear plant into the
Pacific Ocean had a negative impact on the demand for cod and pollock in the wholesale markets of Japan.
A structural break test detected several breaks, including the Fukushima disaster, and successfully eliminated
the impact of the other shocks identified in our analysis. A system of demand equation models, which
take into account the structural breaks, indicated that the spills had a significantly negative impact on the
demand for cod. Our results suggest that the amount of radiation detected in cod products negatively affected
Japanese demand for cod and positively affected demand for pollock, but did not affect their prices.
In addition, we found that consumers’ current concerns about radioactive spills positively affect cod and
pollock markets. We concluded that radioactive spills harm the markets, but the impact is negligible.

We performed a consumer survey to grasp the consumer reaction toward tuna and wakame seaweed produced near the regions near the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant (FDNPP). We gathered nearly 1600 respondents from all parts of Japan and found that consumers, who live at a distance from the FDNPP and have children under the age of 15, require a higher discount rate to accept seafood from regions near the FDNPP. Conversely, our study indicated that consumers who trust the current safety standards for radioactive material concentrations in food, are knowledgeable about radiation and radioactive materials, have high environmental consciousness, and are older are more likely to purchase seafood from regions near the plant.

Possible influences of the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011 to seafood prices in Japan was investigated by comparing long-term price changes of fish in international and Japanese domestic markets. The FAO Fish Price Index for several countries and seafood wholesale price index in Japan are calculated for this purpose. According to the FAO, trade in fish and fishery products has been expanding considerably in recent decades, fuelled by expanding fishery and aquaculture production and driven by high demand (SOFIA2016). Japan is one of the major seafood importing countries. Domestic seafood prices are considered to be highly affected by international seafood prices in Japan. However, few previous analyses exist on the relationship between Japanese and international seafood prices using actual statistical data. In this study FAO Fish Price Index are calculated for Japanese and international seafood prices by species to examine such relationships. The data of import quantities and import value from 1990 to 2013 by FAO and the Ministry of Agriculture Forestry and Fisheries of Japan was used. The data of wholesale quantities and wholesale value from 1992 to 2015 by the Ministry of Agriculture Forestry and Fisheries and central wholesale markets in Japan was used. It was found that no remarkable difference was found between the indexes of Japan and Western countries from 1990 to 2013. Positive correlations were found between import fish prices in Japan and other countries (including USA, Thailand, and European countries) during this period. Both international and domestic seafood prices rose in 2011. But other world food prices also rose in 2011 (Tveterås 2012), which suggests that the seafood price hike can be largely explained by the high demand for food in the world, and that a contribution by the Great East Japan Earthquake could be relatively small.

There has been a reputation of radioactive contamination for foods from the devastated areas by the Great East Japan Earthquake. According to the report of Consumer Affairs Agency 2016, approximately 20 percentage of general consumers avoided to buy foods under the criterion of Japan government (100Bq/kg). Meanwhile, marine products produced in Fukushima Prefecture have tested negative under the criterion since April 2015 (http://www.jfa.maff.go.jp/j/housyanou/kekka.html).
Few studies exist regarding the reputation, and no research has been implemented regarding marine products from Fukushima Prefecture. In this research, we focused on the characteristics of those who boycott safe marine products produced in the devastated region.
We made a questionnaire and outsource to collect the questionnaire to Cross Marketing Inc. We employed conjoint analysis with latent class model and posterior probability analysis using logistic regression to narrow down the those who boycott the seafood. The attributes (levels) include price (170 Yen/80g, 298 Yen/125g), prefectural origin (Domestic, Miyagi, Fukushima, Ibaraki), local origin (No local origin, Ishinomaki, Shiogama, Iwaki, Soma, Joban, Hazaki), ecolabel (No label, MSC, MEL,), product type (No buy, Cod filet, Boiled whitebait).
Latent class analysis divided participants into three classes. 27.5% of participants are categorized into class1, 41.0 into class2, and 31.5 into class3. The class1 represented the respondents who boycotted products from the devastated regions. The characteristics of boycotters neither believed results from all bodies inspecting seafood radioactivity, nor frequently bought Cod filet or Boiled whitebait. They also had tendencies that they did not recognize MSC, earned higher salary, and were relatively elder people.

The 2011 earthquake and tsunami impacted multiple aspects of the fishing industries, from destructions and changes in fishing and processing sector assets and public infrastructure to natural environment to community life. Hence, a recovery effort and evaluation of such effort require multifaceted perspective. The study evaluates a present status of fishing industries in Sanriku region in comparison to the pre-2011 earthquake and tsunami period by using the Fishery Performance Indicators (FPI). The FPI is a holistic assessment tool developed by Anderson et al. [PLoS ONE 10(5) (2015)], which allows us to evaluate fisheries from economic, community, and ecological standpoint through consultation. Semi-structured interviews with fishermen, processors, fish market managers, researchers, and fisheries managers were first conducted. Based on the information solicited from the interviews, we scored each fishery against 122 FPI metrics. The FPI metrics are designed for capture fishery, and therefore, some of the metrics are not directly applicable in a case where fishermen’s livelihoods rely on both aquaculture and capture fishery. Hence, we extend the FPI to include scores that let us evaluate the combined aquaculture and capture fishery practice in our analysis. Initial findings suggest that some fisheries suffer from the declined management capabilities. In some cases, Fukushima nuclear power plant accident resulted in lower scores for Market & Market Institutions, which evaluates the opportunities to access markets, due to trade restrictions posed by other countries. Overall, gender scores were low, as female often do not have decision making powers despite their significant roles in post-harvesting activities. The study aims to contribute to the recovery of the fishing industries in the impacted areas by providing holistic assessment, data, and information that can be used in future recovery planning and marine and coastal resource management.

[Background]
In Japan after the Great East Japan Earthquake, recovery of fishery market and people’s consumption has been a huge challenge, since consumer behavior has been temporally and qualitatively different from usual status. In such transient situation, strategic recovery based on prompt detection of consumers’ thoughts and behaviors is required, and recently, social media such as Twitter (a well-known microblogging service) has received attention as a “social sensor” for that. Therefore, taking the oyster market as a case study target, this research aims to analyze Twitter posts (tweets) in order to detect the trends of consumers’ thoughts and behaviors along with the recovery of oyster production after the earthquake.


[Method]
9416 tweets which include both “oyster” and “earthquake disaster” in their contents and were posted from January 1st of 2011 to December 31st of 2016 were extracted from the archive. Term frequency was initially investigated through morphological analysis. Also, each tweets’ semantic orientation was analyzed in sentiment analysis. Then, the temporal density transition of people’s thoughts and behaviors on oysters after earthquake were visualized in chronological order.

[Results and Conclusion]
As the results, some concerns about radioactive contamination and compassions toward producers were observed right after the earthquake. Then, as significant secondary information diffusion from news and TV programs, the “gift-back” stories of France and other regions of Japan and “huge effort” stories of oyster producers have been shared many times. Also, there has been a huge trend of “owner system” to support oyster producers as people demanded, registered to, and enjoyed the share of recovered harvest. All in all, this research demonstrated that microblog data enables detection of the information that people consider interesting and worthwhile to share with others, and can be used as a social sensor to build the agile-up strategy for recovery from colossal disasters.

Very large sea wall construction was executed for recovery from Great East Japan Earthquake disaster along the coasts of the Pacific in Tohoku District of Japan. The affairs aimed at to protect the margin of national land and disaster risk reduction of human habitat.
Social and legal systems of these coastal construction recovery affairs were analysed. Sea Coast Law, Acts related to Land Use, Disaster Recovery Special Law and real estate management social customs were very complicated in usual times. When the disaster recovery, governmental systems were collapsed and degraded, then all sectors could not solve and change these latent problems.
Fishery villages were changed totally by big construction project to move human habitat to the upper hills and covered with concrete protection facilities.
Originally fishery people judge their circumstances for fishery activities by various senses. Then, shutting the visual openings of the fishery villages is very serious problem for their personal and professional life.
Cases of fishery villages in Miyagi and Iwate prefecture were analysed. Especially, comparative studies the process of decision making Kesen-numa City revealed that participatory process in decision making of the villages was critical. Administration stratum and sectionalism were obstacle to make the residential design freely.
Many lessons learned should be utilized to prevent next recovery project in the world.