Japan running out of tuna

TOKYO, June 25 (UPI) -- Japanese sushi chefs, faced with shortages of bluefin tuna, are experimenting with alternatives, including deer meat, horse meat and U.S.-style avocado rolls.

The shortages, reflected by global fishing bodies' recent limit lowerings on the world's tuna fisheries, are being caused in part by the growing popularity of sushi worldwide, including in Russia, South Korea and China, The New York Times reported Monday.

"It's like America running out of steak," said Tadashi Yamagata, vice chairman of Japan's national union of sushi chefs. "Sushi without tuna just would not be sushi."

Japan's Fisheries Agency said the average price of imported frozen northern and Pacific bluefin has risen by more than a third, to $13 a pound, since the start of 2006.

"Fish that would have gone to Tokyo are now ending up in New York or Shanghai," said Sasha Issenberg, the author of "The Sushi Economy." "This has been devastating to Japan's national esteem."

One Japanese restaurant owner, Shigekazu Ozoe, said he experimented with deer and horse meat last time the tuna supply went dry in 1973.

"We tasted it, and horse sushi was pretty good," he said. "It was soft, easy to bite off, had no smell."