In the first 8 months of 2010, there were 132 enterprises participating in exporting pangasius to EU with 143,611 MT, valued at US$332.8 million, down 1.8% in volume and 7.8% in value over the same period last year. Spain and Germany were 2 countries with the most import volume but also significantly reduced compared to others in EU. In fact, wholesale price and volume of pangasius at the largest food service center in Madrid, Spain did not decline this year.
European debt crisis in the earlier this year has decreased importers’ confidence. The EUR depreciated against the USD makes importers not active in buying for inventory. Evenly, importers offer to purchase pangasius at low price to compensate for shrinking profits because of the EUR depreciation.
However, up to now, the weakening USD against the EUR has made more profits to importers through importing pangasius from Vietnam in USD. Therefore, they desire to import a quantity of this item to prepare for the upcoming New Year and Christmas, but their import price for pangasius has not increased.
Some enterprises offered pangasius export price to EU at 2.8 USD/kg as price of domestic raw materials is rising.