Vietfish 2013 attracts thousands of visitors

The exhibition attracted thousands of visitors, hundreds of enterprises from Vietnam and foreigner countries. Relevant State regulatory agencies and foreign countries’ consulate in Vietnam also joined the exhibition on the occasion of its opening plenary.

At the ceremony, General Secretary of the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP) Truong Dinh Hoe highlighted Vietnam fishery industry’s efforts in the past years. Vietnam fishery industry has gained remarkable achievements, contributing to Vietnam’s economic-social development although Vietnam fishery industry has been affected by a global economic distress, lack of raw material and commercial barriers.

Seafood export turnover surpassed US$6 billion and contributed remarkably into the country’s export revenue. More and more high value seafood products from Vietnam are favored by consumers and gain popularity in the global market. To attain these achievements, Vietnam seafood enterprises have been making many efforts to improve their performance.

VASEP is proud to be an organizer of Vietfish, which cooperates with enterprises to implement trade promotion activities effectively since its establishment in 1998.

The year 2013 is expected to be another tough period for seafood business; however, Vietfish 2013 still features nearly 200 booths displaying seafood products and services and 30,000 visitors visiting the expo.

Addressing at the opening ceremony of Vietfish 2013, Deputy Minister of the Industry and Trade, Mr. Tran Tuan Anh remarked that Vietnam fishery industry has made a lot of efforts to maintain its export turnover during the past years. However, seafood processors are facing a lot of bottlenecks such as: increasing production costs due to high price of raw material, fish feed, veterinary drugs, electricity and water. These bottlenecks are reducing Vietnam seafood products’ competitiveness. To meet the export target set for this year of $6.5 billion, seafood enterprises need to enhance their capacity of production, exports; improve the quality of seafood products; take full advantage from supports of associations and trade promotion agencies. Therefore, associations and trade promotion agencies need to boost trade promotion activities inside and outside the country.

Amid difficulties in consumer markets and capital, seafood enterprise community, farmers and stakeholders desire to receive supports from competent authorities from central to local level who have the capacity to solve internal problems of seafood industry. However, the most important factors, which help enterprises to overcome the current hardship, are their efforts and the close link among them, Mr Tran Thien Hai, the VASEP’s Chairman said.

Vietfish, a leading and professional aquaculture exhibition in Southeast Asia, has become an essential event of Vietnam’s seafood industry.

Normally, Vietfish is held in June every year. However, this period is near the time when large international seafood trade fairs such as Boston Seafood Show, European Seafood Exposition, the Japan International Seafood and Technology Expo usually take place. Therefore, many seafood enterprises can’t take part in Vietfish to meet, exchange information and learn about market and customer trends.

After collecting enterprises’ opinions and receiving the approval of VASEP’s executive committee, since 2014, Vietfish will be annually held in August 6-8.