Image: Vasep / FIS

Tuna Industry Needs to Resolve Raw Material Bottlenecks

VIET NAM
Wednesday, June 19, 2024, 07:00 (GMT + 9)

Tuna exports continue to maintain growth momentum in May 2024, up 21% over the same period. Cumulatively in the first 5 months of 2024, Vietnam's tuna exports reached more than 386 million USD, up 22% over the same period.

Of which canned tuna products increased by 41%, other processed tuna increased by 12%, frozen tuna meat/loin increased by 7% and fresh, frozen and dried tuna increased nearly 3 times over the same period. 2023.

Source: Stockfile FIS

Tuna exports to most markets will increase compared to the same period in 2023. Accordingly, the two largest markets, the US and EU, account for 37% and 23%, respectively, of Vietnam's total tuna exports in the first 5 months of 2024. South and recorded growth of 22% and 36% over the same period in 2023.

In addition, tuna exports to Israel, Russia and South Korea are increasing the most, 55%, 70% and 76% respectively...

Source: Panamei Seafood -->

Tuna exports to the US and EU grew slowly

In May, tuna exports to the US and EU continued to maintain growth momentum over the same period. However, the growth rate has slowed down compared to previous months, only reaching 10% and 30% respectively this month.

In the EU market, the export growth rate to some main markets in May slowed down, such as Germany increased by 22% and the Netherlands increased by 26%. Currently, only Italy continues to maintain high growth momentum at 3 digits, up 224% compared to May 2023.

<-- Source: Stockfile FIS

According to businesses, it is difficult for Vietnam's tuna exports to the EU to maintain this growth rate in the second half of the year, when preferential tariff quotas have been used up.

"Knot" in raw materials

In the structure of tuna export value in recent years, more than 50% of the value is created from imported raw materials because domestic exploitation does not meet the demand for export processing and is unstable.

Meanwhile, many businesses are complaining about the difficulty of making raw material certification (S/C) of domestically exploited raw materials.

Source: Stockfile FIS  -->

There are many reasons why businesses cannot receive S/C after purchasing raw materials due to some problems in the previous stages that are difficult for businesses to know clearly, such as the issue of confirming food safety conditions for fishing vessels or The problem of fishing vessels operating in waters that do not comply with regulations... Although these fishing vessels are still allowed to go out to sea to exploit normally, are inspected and allowed to dock normally.

Or a situation that occurred in the last 2-3 months, quite a few fishing vessels installed monitoring systems via the telecommunications network continuously failed, causing the fishing vessels to lose connection to cruise monitoring for 6 hours or more. Some ships take up to 2-3 days, directly affecting the business's S/C paper making process.

<-- Source: Stockfile FIS

From the above reality, provinces and localities need to well and promptly implement the confirmation of food safety conditions for fishing vessels and fishing ports according to regulations as well as strictly implement the permission for departure and arrival of fishing vessels. when the conditions prescribed by law are not met;...

The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development is considering amending regulations so that S/C raw material certification can be issued immediately to businesses when they have completed loading and unloading raw materials from fishing vessels under the supervision of port staff. in terms of type, volume... at fishing ports; Provide guidance and direction on handling S/C papers for cases where fishing vessels lose connection due to confirmed service provider errors.

If these shortcomings are resolved, by 2024 Vietnam's tuna industry will have a chance to return to the billion USD mark.

Author: Nguyen Ha | Vasep (Translated from the original in Vietnamese)

[email protected]
www.seafood.media

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