During the final day of the Global Aquaculture Alliance’s (GAA) Global Outlook for Aquaculture Leadership (GOAL) conference in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, attendees were treated to two key market perspectives, one on China and the other on Indonesia.
Zhu Changliang, CEO of Wuhan Lanesync Supply Chain Management Co. Ltd. in Wuhan City, China, gave attendees some surprising takes on what the Chinese market wants from its seafood imports. Lanesync is focused on the foodservice market in China.
“Customers are losing confidence in the seafood produced in China with heavily polluted farm resources and feeds additives over 30 years of rapid economic development,” he said. Theoretically, he added, seafood imports will continue to grow by many billions of dollars annually, particularly in the next three years. “It’s an opportunity for suppliers all around the world.”
There are barriers, however. Cultural differences, food habits, communication issues and a “conservative mentality of business weaken credibility for both sides,” he said, adding that he rarely sees companies with long-term business plans for the China market.
So what do Chinese seafood distributors want? Products that have unquestioned food-safety records, trustworthy brands, smooth communication and good service. The key to long-term success in China, he added, is extensive R&D, promotion on new dishes and stable supply and prices.
“The foundation of branding is R&D, which should focus on culture differences,” he said. “The right partner will accelerate growth in Chinese market,” which, he added is heavily leaning toward e-commerce.
Meanwhile, Indonesia is the “most culturally diverse country on Earth, consisting of 1,340 ethnic groups and 546 local languages,” said Dr. Ir. Rokhmin Dahuri, Indonesian Aquaculture Society chairman and senior scientist at the Center for Coastal and Marine Resources Studies at Bogor Agricultural University. Dahuri said Indonesia’s annual economic growth stands at 5.8 percent, second only to China’s mark of 7.7 percent, citing World Bank data.
But the gap between the rich and poor in the country is ever widening, he said. Despite Indonesia’s USD 1.2 trillion GDP (EUR 947 billion), with predictions to be the seventh-largest in the world by 2030, the poverty line in Indonesia is just USD 30 (EUR 23.69) a month.
