There's a new book due out in May called "The Sushi Economy: Globalization and the Making of a Modern Delicacy" by Sasha Issenberg. This is from the publisher's blurb (PDF):
Over one generation, sushi in the united States has gone from unknown to ubiquitous, but even aficionados will be surprised to learn the true history and complex economics behind their favorite food. Combining the biographical spirit of Cod, the behind-the-scenes restaurant-world detail of Kitchen Confidential, and the quirky and contrarian exploration of globalization’s dynamics of How Soccer Explains the World, journalist Sasha Issenberg traces sushi’s journey from Tokyo street snack to global delicacy. The Sushi Economy covers such topics as:
• The birth of modern sushi (in Canada)
• How New England bluefin tuna went from being sold as cat food to reigning as Japan’s most prized culinary frill, increasing in value 10,000% over two decades
• The mysterious underworld of pirates, smugglers, and the tuna black market
• What sushi chefs are really doing behind the bar
• How Australia’s tuna cowboys became wealthy tuna barons by learning to ranch two-hundred-pound fish
• Nobu Matsuhisa and the making of a global sushi palate
• What the popularity of sushi reveals about China’s future
The Sushi Economy jumps from Mediterranean docks to the multimillion-dollar tuna auctions of Japanese fish markets, and from the shopping streets of Shanghai to the cargo holds of intercontinental jumbo jets, all while making a surprising case against eating local. Readers will never see the food on their plate ― or the world around them ― the same way again.
Book excerpt:
"Standing sentinel over a glass caisson of small plastic-wrapped pylons of fish, the sushi chef is merely a charismatic front man for an invisible world. Behind him is a web of buyers and sellers, producers and distributors, agents, brokers, and dealers that extends from everywhere there is a net that needs to be emptied to any place there is a plate that can be filled. On their way from the ocean to the restaurant, some fish take a multicontinental voyage of days, weeks, and in certain cases months or years, crossing borders, being subjected to tariffs, having value assessed more than half a dozen times, and visiting more airports than most business travelers.
Sushi as we know it is very much an invention of the late twentieth century, in particular the flows of money, power, people, and culture that define the era’s interconnectedness. Jet travel allows perishable goods to speed over oceans. fishermen call in their catch across distant seas via satellite phone. Agents are able to sustain orders by quickly moving capital across currencies to out-of-the-way docks in third world countries. As the world gets smaller, the selection in those glass cases gets bigger―and better. Eating at a sushi bar, then, is not so much an escape from fast-paced global commerce as an immersion in it."
