(vasep.com.vn) In the Covid era and social distancing that has lasting for more than a year has caused the trend of seafood consumption to change. While fresh, raw, and frozen seafood is negatively affected because of Covid, aquatic products with a long shelf life and easy processing rises in popularity. That is the reason for the nearly 9% growth in Vietnam canned seafood export in 2020 with sales of over 331 million USD.
Covid created the era of canned products
In the first two months of 2021, the growth rate of canned seafood exports was even more of a breakthrough, up by 42%, reaching nearly 55 million USD, accounting for nearly 6% of the total seafood export turnover.
In 2020, the main species of canned seafood for export included tuna, scad, herring, saury, mackerel, crab, and shrimp ... In which canned and pouched tuna accounted for a large proportion of 66%, canned crab meat accounted for 13%, scallops 8%, shrimp 1.6%, chub mackerel accounted for nearly 2% ...
Canned tuna products include cut skipjack, yellowfin, big eyed tuna in salt/oil/water.
Related to crab products, Vietnam has pasteurized canned and pasteurized processed crab meat exported to Europe, America, Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, and Thailand ...
In 2020, there were 90 import markets for canned seafood from Vietnam, of which the top 10 markets included the US, Thailand, Germany, Egypt, Canada, Japan, France, Israel, Hong Kong, and Jordan, accounting for 73% of total exports. The US accounted for 38%, being the dominant proportion.
There were over 40 enterprises exporting canned seafood products in 2020, of which the top 10 enterprises accounted for 84%, mainly tuna exporters. In which, the top 3 companies named Highland Dragon accounted for 21% of export turnover, Pataya 16% and Foodtech accounted for 11.5%.
In the first two months of 2021, 28 enterprises participated in exporting canned and bagged seafood to the world market. Top 10 exporting enterprises accounted for over 83% with about 44.5 million USD. In which, the top 3 biggest companies were Highland Dragon, Pataya and Yueh Chyang Canned Food, accounting for 19.4%, 14% and 10% respectively.
There were 55 import markets for Vietnamese canned seafood in the first 2 months of this year, of which the top 10 markets accounted for over 84% with a value of about $ 45 million. The US accounted for the largest proportion (40%) thanks to a sharp increase in sales of nearly 60% over the same period. Except for Germany, the remaining markets in the top 10 such as Japan, Canada, Egypt, Australia, Thailand ... all increased strongly in canned fish imports from Vietnam.
It is forecasted that in 2021, canned and pouched seafood products of Vietnam will continue to take advantage of opportunities in the markets, at least in the first half of the year when the Covid epidemic is not yet controlled in the world.
