New York: The Japanese government launched a campaign Thursday to promote Japanese fishery products and regional tourism at restaurants in New York.

The campaign is aimed at boosting consumption of Japanese fishery products, whose exports have been sluggish since Japan’s Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant started discharging tritium-containing treated water into the ocean in August 2023.

Participating restaurants will serve dishes featuring Japanese fishery items, including scallops from Hokkaido, salmon from Shizuoka Prefecture, and fiery squid from Toyama Prefecture. The campaign will run until mid-March.

Booklets about the production sites of the items will be available at the restaurants. By scanning a quick response, or QR, code on the booklets, visitors can obtain information about tourist attractions at the sites.

“We hope people will increase their interest in regional areas of Japan through food,” an official at the Japanese Consulate General in New York said.

Japan’s scallop exports dropped 24% in 2023 from the previous year to 68.9 billion yen after China imposed an import ban on Japanese fishery products in August last year over the release of the treated water.

JIJI Press