On a gloomy day pregnant with rain and the weight of past expectations, tuna fisherman Minoru Nakamura is welcomed back to port by his family in Ishiki like a conquering hero. Three generations wait onshore, including Mr Nakamura’s father Toshiaki and newborn child Misaki, smiles wide and cameras primed, as his boat sails into harbour. On this remote island off southern Japan, where rusting boats wait for fishermen who increasingly stay at home, few sights excite more than Mr Nakamura’s precious cargo: a 172kg (380lb) bluefin tuna, splayed across the deck of his small trawler. Mr Nakamura has been dubbed Japan’s King of Fish. At peak prices his single catch will fetch over 1.5m yen, (£10,600) at the world’s biggest fish market in Tsukiji, Tokyo. By the time it is carved up and sold as thousands of sushi, sashimi and steak cuts to restaurants across the capital, it will be worth at least three times that much – the price of a luxury family car. But among many of Ishiki’s 32,000 population, one-in-eight of whom depend on the sea to survive, the talk is of now one thing: the extinction of their livelihood. ‘In […]