News Lucrative overseas opportunities for Japanese sushi chefs

Sushi chefs are in such high demand abroad that they could earn up to three times more than in Tokyo's prestigious Ginza district. This revelation has sparked interest in the profession. Hitoshi Oyamada, a 40-year-old sushi chef, experienced this firsthand. After being told about the booming sushi scene in Singapore, he decided to move in 2021, during the height of the pandemic. Oyamada, who was on leave from work due to health concerns, needed a financial boost to support his two children living with his ex-wife following their divorce.

In Singapore, he started working at a restaurant with just a counter with about a dozen seats. Converted to yen, the average spending per customer was between 50,000 and 60,000 JPY (approx. USD 350 to 420), and his annual take-home pay shot up more than threefold to some 15 million JPY (USD 104,000). His monthly wage at a restaurant in Ginza, where he used to work until his relocation, was 400,000 JPY (USD 2,800), and his annual take-home pay was less than 4.8 million JPY (USD 33,000).

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The Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare reported that Japanese cuisine cooks, including sushi chefs, earn an average annual salary of 3.58 million JPY (approximately USD 25,000). However, as Kikuchi pointed out, there's fierce competition among restaurants to recruit talented sushi chefs. The more renowned the restaurant, the more intense the headhunting battles become. Some sushi chefs are even offered monthly salaries exceeding several million JPY. This is partly because becoming a sushi chef in Japan is a demanding process. As the saying goes, it takes three years to master rice cooking and another eight years to perfect sushi making. This is why restaurants prefer to hire experienced chefs rather than invest in training new ones. The ultimate goal for many sushi chefs is to be recruited to work at prestigious restaurants overseas.