(seafood.vasep.com.vn) South Korea is the largest consumer of Vietnam's cephalopod, accounting for 39% of Vietnam's total cephalopod exports to all markets. In the past 3 years, South Korea's demand for imported cephalopod has maintained a relatively stable growth rate.
In 2017, the export value of Vietnamese cephalopod to Korea reached over US$218 million, up by 32% compared to 2016. As of October this year, Vietnam's export of this product to Korea still increased by 18.2%, reaching nearly US$211 million.
In the first ten months of this year, cephalopod exports to Korea only decreased slightly by 3% in July, while the remaining months increased positively compared to the same period last year. This is a good result in the context of declining cephalopod exports to EU due to "IUU yellow card". Currently, with the export tax to Korea is 0% for fresh / live and frozen octopus products (HS030751 and HS030759), Vietnam can boost exports of these 2 products to Korea. So if there is good supply, Vietnam will have the opportunity to increase market share.
Fresh/frozen octopus is the most exported product in Vietnam's molluscs structure exported to Korea, the second dominant product is dried squid, the third most exported product to Korea is fresh/frozen squid.
According to ITC, in the first 10 months of this year, Korea imported squid and octopus from 9 sources. After the import plummeted in 2017, importing cephalopod into Korea by October this year increased by 26% compared to the same period in 2017, reaching over US$321 million. This can be considered a good signal cephalopod suppliers for the Korean market.
China is the largest supply of this item to Korea (accounting for 55% market share), followed by Peru (29%), Vietnam ranked third with 11%. Korea increased imports from all major supply sources, while imports from Peru increased the most by 51%.
In the first 10 months of this year, in the structure of imported cephalopod products, only frozen / dried / salted / salted octopus (HS code 030759) decreased by 59%. The import value of the remaining products increased compared to the same period last year, in which the value of processed squid (HS 160554) increased the most by 49%.