To bring safety and integrity to the whole sushi supply chain
For the last five years, sushi has been rising and rising – and then rising some more.
What was once a luxury cuisine is now an everyday meal, enjoyed the world over. And while growth is good, it brings its own set of challenges – chief among them food safety and product integrity. Excellence in these two areas is central to continued category growth and has never been more important. And that’s what we at the NFI Sushi Council are all about.
Our mission has three main tasks:
Food safety scares cause consumer distrust – and sushi, often eaten raw, could easily see its reputation damaged after an incident. That’s why the Council provides resources on industry-wide best practices for the proper transportation, receiving, handling and preparation of sushi and sashimi products.
The correct labeling of species on restaurant menus and retail packaging is critical for an accurate and safe sushi supply chain. In addition, consumer confusion exists over product claims such as sushi- or sashimi ‘grade’. Therefore the Council works to establish systems that better ensure the proper menuing of species and the standardization of product labeling.
Featuring a countless variety of seafood species and preparations, sushi meets a vast range of taste preferences providing a perfect entry point into the category, and driving seafood sales. To maintain this momentum, the Council works to keep promoting sushi as far, as wide and as innovatively as possible.
Formed in 2024, the National Fisheries Institute Sushi Council is a pre-competitive stakeholder group made up of fish farmers, harvesters, processors, distributors and end-users at retail and foodservice. We work across the world to enhance sushi product integrity and promote industry-led food safety.
In our first year, the Council has held meetings and panel discussions on scope and organization at the Global Seafood Market Conference and the Seafood Expo North America. We’ve also formed a steering committee of industry and technical personnel to write, edit and publish a comprehensive and fully accessible food safety sushi guide for use throughout the value chain. There’ll be much more to come and we’re excited to be leading the way for both the industry and for sushi.
The Sushi Council welcomes any company that produces, processes, imports, prepares, sells or markets sushi products, whether they are NFI Members or not.
In the last year, a whole host of businesses, representing every step of sushi production, have signed up, including the following:
So how about you?
To help us achieve our mission, the NFI Sushi Council is always looking to increase stakeholder involvement and is actively recruiting. We believe that a unified supply chain effort with strong, co-created industry standards will lead to improved sushi products and increased consumption. So if you’re interested in joining, we encourage you to get in touch today.
Powered by the NFI
The Sushi Council is an industry group under the National Fisheries Institute, the leading U.S. seafood trade association. Learn more about NFI HERE.