Mark Godfrey is an Irish journalist covering the agriculture and fisheries sectors in Asia, with a focus on China. Proficient in Mandarin, he has frequently traveled across China's fisheries and aquaculture regions and learned the inner workings of China's corporate world during a nearly three-year stint at the Financial Times' “China Confidential” publication. He has also reported widely across Southeast Asia and the former Soviet Union. He has educational certificates in agriculture and food science, as well as Mandarin.
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U.S. representatives at the World Trade Organization (WTO) have shifted their position in ongoing negotiations to end harmful fishery subsidies around the world, marking a change that is likely to further complicate the next batch of talks on the subject that are set to start on 14 July.
Some WTO delegates have proposed two tiers to target harmful fishery subsidies – a first tier targeting larger subsidizing nations and a second tier
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The Best Aquaculture Practices (BAP) certification program, which is operated by the Global Seafood Alliance (GSA), has experienced a surge in applications from seafood firms supplying China’s domestic market.
New applicants targeting the Chinese domestic market accounted for just 3 percent of new applications in the country as recently as five years ago, but that figure now stands at 50 percent, according to Iris Xin Wang, who is the
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The Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) has opened a second office in China in order to better serve the nation’s large and diverse seafood industry.
The new office is located in Qianhai – a district within the city of Shenzhen, which has been seeking to develop a more robust tuna industry.
Qianhai Authority Director Xie Huihui said the new MSC office will “effectively promote the sustainable development of regional fisheries in
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The Canadian province of Nova Scotia is trying to secure alternative markets outside of China for its seafood exports in an attempt to protect producers from the ongoing trade war between the two nations.
“We know tariffs add further uncertainty for seafood exporters in Nova Scotia; however, it is too soon to know what those impacts are. To help our companies, we are ramping up our work to support expansion into new markets, reaching new
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China has revised its government spending regulations to limit expenditures on entertainment and travel, including on high-end government dinners.
The “Regulations on Strict Economy and Opposing Waste in Party and Government,” published jointly by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the nation’s State Council, state that high-end dishes, cigarettes, and alcohol should not be provided at work meals. Seafood
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The Chinese province of Fujian has signed a memorandum of understanding with Malaysia which will see the two parties cooperate on mariculture and seafood processing goals.
The deal includes exporting aquaculture and processing technology developed in Fujian to the Southeast Asian nation, furthering Chinese ambitions to rival Norway as a provider of seafood technology to global markets.
Guangdong Evergreen Group CEO Chen Dan said in 2024 that
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Chinese seafood-processing firm Dalian Rich Enterprise Group has cited tariffs as the reason for further moving away from its reliance on the U.S. market, but, simultaneously, wants to maintain relationships with the American customer base and the U.S. brand the firm has built up over several decades.
“We hope we can continue selling our products to the U.S. market because we have established very good business relationships with our
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Chinese aquaculture company Yantai Jinghai Marine Fisheries Co. plans to harvest 2,000 metric tons (MT) of Best Aquaculture Practices (BAP)-certified rainbow trout this year.
Of the 2,000-MT total, the company confirmed 1,500 MT will come from its mariculture platforms off the coast of Shandong province, and 500 MT will come from land-based recirculating aquaculture operations.
Yantai General Manager Guo Fuyuan said his company’s first
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According to a new report from the Bord Iascaigh Mhara (BIM), an Irish agency tasked with growing the nation's seafood sector, the total value of the Irish aquaculture industry rose 25 percent in 2024 compared to the year prior.
The agency’s “Business of Seafood 2024” report highlighted that Irish aquaculture production was worth EUR 211 million (USD 241.5 million) last year, driven largely by a 51 percent increase in salmon
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Imported wild-caught seafood coming into China is taking market share from farmed seafood, according to Fan Xubing, the CEO of Beijing-based marketing agency Seabridge.
Pollock, redfish, mackerel, and Greenland halibut all have the potential to outperform farmed species like salmon in sales growth this year, Fan said.
“We researched a recent study and found that in 2023, China's total wild-caught seafood import value [was equivalent
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