Shanghai Fugu Agreement
Encyclopedia
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
state of Hesse
Hesse
Hesse or Hessia is both a cultural region of Germany and the name of an individual German state.* The cultural region of Hesse includes both the State of Hesse and the area known as Rhenish Hesse in the neighbouring Rhineland-Palatinate state...
.
In 1985 the new Green Party prepared to enter into a German state government
States of Germany
Germany is made up of sixteen which are partly sovereign constituent states of the Federal Republic of Germany. Land literally translates as "country", and constitutionally speaking, they are constituent countries...
for the first time in its history. The first Green cabinet minister in German history was going to be Joschka Fischer
Joschka Fischer
Joseph Martin "Joschka" Fischer is a German politician of the Alliance '90/The Greens. He served as Foreign Minister and Vice Chancellor of Germany in the cabinet of Gerhard Schröder from 1998 to 2005...
who later became minister of Foreign Affairs in the German Federal Government under Chancellor Gerhard Schröder
Gerhard Schröder
Gerhard Fritz Kurt Schröder is a German politician, and was Chancellor of Germany from 1998 to 2005. A member of the Social Democratic Party of Germany , he led a coalition government of the SPD and the Greens. Before becoming a full-time politician, he was a lawyer, and before becoming Chancellor...
. The 1985 Hesse coalition under Prime Minister Holger Börner
Holger Börner
Holger Börner was a German politician of the SPD.He was Minister-President of Hesse from 1976 until 1987. In this position, he served as President of the Bundesrat in 1986/87, but only served until the Landtag elections of 24 April 1987.In 1984, he and his SPD lost the majority in the Hesse Landtag...
was to be based on an official policy agreement negotiated by both parties.
During a final night session of the negotiations the Greens presented a demand that Hesse join the "Shanghai Fugu Agreement". This was accepted by their tired Social Democratic counterparts and became official state policy.
The Greens argued that the fugu
Fugu
is the Japanese word for pufferfish and the dish prepared from it, normally species of genus Takifugu, Lagocephalus, or Sphoeroides, or porcupinefish of the genus Diodon. Fugu can be lethally poisonous due to its tetrodotoxin; therefore, it must be carefully prepared to remove toxic parts and to...
fish is well known to be a dangerous delicacy requiring specialized chef
Chef
A chef is a person who cooks professionally for other people. Although over time the term has come to describe any person who cooks for a living, traditionally it refers to a highly skilled professional who is proficient in all aspects of food preparation.-Etymology:The word "chef" is borrowed ...
s who mostly come from Asia. Due to expanding restrictions on work permits restaurants have found it difficult to employ such specialists. The "Shanghai Fugu Agreement" was supposed to provide special regulations for certified fugu chefs internationally.
Chefs in Japan must have certification to handle the fish.
The agreement was absolutely fictional but was neither discovered to be a joke by the Social Democrats during the nightly negotiations nor later by civil servants or the press who went through the coalition contracts. It took years before the Agreement was revealed to be a joke.
Sources
- de: Das Shanghaier Kugelfisch-Abkommen (Newsletter, Green parliamentary group in the Hesse parliament, Fraktionsgrün Nr. 1, May 2004, p. 4)
- de: Obituary for the deceased Holger Börner in the regional daily "Giessener Anzeiger" of 03.08.2006 (mentioning the Fugu Agreement ("Kugelfischabkommen") in § 6)
- de Full German text of coalition agreement of 1985 between SPD and Green Party in Hesse