(seafood.vasep.com.vn) Japan is the leading importer of cephalopod in the world, accounting for more than 17% of the total value of imported cephalopod worldwide. Imports of cephalopod from Japan to 2017 has tended to decrease compared to the period 2013-2016 due to decreasing supply of raw materials and increasing import prices.
According to the statistics of the World Trade Center, in the first 10 months of this year, Japan imported US$295.2 worth million of cephalopod, up 0.3% over the same period last year.
China still maintains the leading supplier of cephalopod to Japan. However, importing this product line from China of Japan tends to decrease. Meanwhile, imports from Vietnam and Peru increased. Besides, Japan is also increasing imports of cephalopod from other Southeast Asian countries such as the Philippines and Thailand.
Processed squid (HS code 160554) and processed octopus (HS code 160555) are the two most imported products in Japan. In the first 10 months of this year, Japan increased imports of processed octopus and reduced imports of processed squid. Imports of raw materials (HS code 030749) into Japan although only accounted for a small value but grew remarkably by 42% in the first 10 months of this year.
Currently, processed octopus products imported from Thailand and the Philippines into Japan have advantages with 0% tax rate, while from Vietnam and Indonesia is 1.8%, and from China 6.9%. Thus, processed octopus products of Vietnam are facing tax disadvantages compared to Thailand and the Philippines in the Japanese market.
According to Vietnam Customs data, as of November this year, Vietnam exported octopus and octopus to Japan reached US$138.9 million, up 2.2% compared to the same period in 2017. Exporting this item from Vietnam returned to Japan to recover by 23% in November 2018 after falling by 12% in October.
In previous years, Japan imported a large amount of cephalopod from Morocco, Mauritania but from 2017 until now, Morocco and Mauritania have not exported much cephalopod to Japan as the source for exploitation had plummeted, leading to an increase in export prices. Therefore, Japan turned to cephalopod suppliers in the Asia region.