THE ASAHI SHIMBUN
January 5, 2020 at 18:25 JST
A Tokyo-based sushi chain operator landed the big catch of the day for the second year in a row at this year's first auction at the Toyosu fish market in the capital's Koto Ward on Jan. 5.
Kiyomura Corp., which operates the Sushizanmai chain, placed a winning bid of 193.2 million yen ($1.79 million) for a bluefin tuna weighing 276 kilograms.
“I placed a bid in the hopes of giving the best tuna to our customers,” said Kiyomura President Kiyoshi Kimura. “I would like our customers to have sushi as much as possible.”
The bidding price was the second-highest ever after Kiyomura shelled out 333.6 million yen for a 278-kilo tuna in the first auction of 2019.
Both tuna were caught off Oma, Aomori Prefecture. Kiyomura is a familiar face in the annual bidding war, winning the New Year's auction for six consecutive years until 2017.
This year’s bidding, which started at 5:10 a.m., marked the first under Reiwa, the era for Emperor Naruhito, who was enthroned in May.
It was the second time the Toyosu market has held the New Year's auction after it took over operations of the Tsukiji market, located about 2 kilometers away, in October 2018.
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The bluefin tuna that fetched the highest price at the New Year's auction at the Toyosu fish market is unloaded from a truck in Tokyo’s Tsukiji district on Jan. 5. (Kazuhiro Nagashima)
