Shrimp exports outreached US$3 billion

According to Vietnam Customs, in 2013, the country exported its shrimp to 88 markets, earning back US$3.1 billion, up 39.1 percent year-on-year. Shrimp exports in the year made a great contribution to compensate for losses from other seafood exports and boost total seafood exports to exceed the target of US$6.5 billion and hit US$6.72 billion, up 9.6 percent year-on-year. Shrimp sales made up 45 percent of the total seafood exports of the country.

Positive growth in shrimp exports to top 10 leading importers

In 2013, Vietnam’s shrimp sales to leading importing markets (the U.S., Japan, EU, China, Australia, Canada, Taiwan and ASEAN) witnessed a sharp increase over 2012. Exports to the U.S. reported the highest growth of 82.5 percent with US$831 million. Exports to EU touched US$409.4 million, representing an increase of 31.3 percent.

Despite being downgraded to the second position in the top Vietnam shrimp importers, shrimp sales to Japan in 2013 increased by 14.7 percent to US$708.7 million. On January 21^st 2014, Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare of Japan has officially notified the MRL of Ethoxyquin in Vietnam shrimp imported into the market. The new MRL is fixed at 0.2 ppm against the earlier 0.01 ppm. Besides, Japan decided to lift the regulation of 100 percent Ethoxyquin testing on Vietnam’s shrimp imported into the market. The new decision is expected to improve shrimp exports of Vietnam to the market in 2014.

Vannamei occupied 50 percent of total shrimp exports

In 2013, Vietnam exported US$1.58 billion of whiteleg shrimp, reporting a year-on-year rise of 113 percent and making up 50.7 percent of total shrimp exports while the proportion of exported black tiger shrimp was 42.7 percent with US$1.33 billion, up only 6.3 percent.

Shrimp farmers stocked more whiteleg shrimp in 2013 because of hiking raw shrimp price, high domestic demand and low global supply caused by EMS. Particularly, farmers in the Mekong Delta give priority to rear whiteleg shrimp thanks to its shorter farming period and high productivity and price.

Japan - the 1^st largest importer of Vietnam black tiger shrimp

Although Vietnam shrimp exporters faces to Ethoxyquin barriers and strong competition with Indian exporters in Japan market, Vietnam remained to be the largest supplier of black tiger shrimp to the market. In Japan market, Vietnam’s black tiger shrimp is more competitive than that from India thanks to its high quality and reasonable price.

The U.S. ranked the 1^st in importing vannamei shrimp from Vietnam

In 2013, the U.S. increased importing shrimp from Vietnam and India because of increase in their whiteleg shrimp production and low vannamei supply from Thailand caused by EMS.

Through October 2013, Vietnam shrimp imports by the U.S. hit 46,522 MT, up 44.8 percent over the same period of 2012 (32,125 MT). While the market sourced 78,104 MT of Indian shrimp from 49,774 MT in the first 10 months of 2012, up 57 percent.