Mark Godfrey

Contributing Editor

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.


Author Archive

Published on
October 25, 2023

The Gulf of Guinea off the coast of West Africa experiences some of the highest rates of illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing in the world, but closer collaboration between Beijing-based officials and West African nations could help limit the IUU actions of Chinese vessels in the region, a new report details.

Published by the Stimson Center, a Washington, D.C., U.S.A.-based nonprofit that analyzes issues related to world peace,

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Published on
October 24, 2023

Labor campaigners have accused the Irish government of reneging on a commitment to protect migrant fishery workers by not introducing legislative amendments it had promised unions it would implement four years ago.

The accusations hit a boiling point in relation to a case that an Egyptian migrant fisher named Elamir Elmadkhoum brought forth regarding long working hours. In response to Elmadkhoum’s filing, Ireland’s High Court in May

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Published on
October 19, 2023

The European Union has taken steps that would tighten Chinese seafood’s access to the European market by approving new fisheries control rules that aim to prevent seafood caught by illegal, unregulated, and unreported (IUU) fishing activities from entering its ports.

Campaigners have long advocated for more transparency on distant-water fishing, including calls for public access to information on the ownership of fishing vessels and

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Published on
October 18, 2023

This year’s autumn holiday season in China, which has historically involved elevated levels of seafood demand, is acting as a harbinger for seafood exporters considering whether to resume shipments to one of the world’s largest importing nations, with most hoping that inconsistent Chinese demand will stabilize in the near future.

“I believe that we are moving good volumes at the moment for the national holiday coming up in

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Published on
October 12, 2023

China’s shrimp industry has pinned its waning hopes at a revival this year on the country’s autumn holiday season, which traditionally results in a boost in nationwide seafood sales.

This year’s mid-autumn festival in China overlaps with the country’s annual National Day holiday, leading to a longer holiday season than usual.

Any boost in sales would be welcome news to firms like Guolian Aquatic, which has blamed falling

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Published on
October 10, 2023

Geopolitical and global economic shifts are driving trade between Saudi Arabia and China, while simultaneously helping the former country achieve its ambitions of dramatically increasing its aquaculture output by 2030.

Chinese aquaculture and feed firm Guangdong Evergreen Group inked a memorandum of understanding with the Saudi firm Falcon Vision this past spring, and in June 2023, Zhanjiang Guolian Aquatic Products and Saudi sovereign Public

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Published on
October 2, 2023
In an ongoing attempt to limit overcapacity and overfishing in the world’s oceans, the World Trade Organization (WTO) has proposed a two-tier reporting regime for its member states amid continued negotiations on ending harmful subsidies, which will subject the largest subsidizers of fishery activities to a higher level of scrutiny. Icelandic WTO Ambassador Einar Gunnarsson described the proposed setup as a “two-tier sustainability-based… Read More
Published on
September 28, 2023

Soon after NOAA released a report identifying China as one of several nations it alleges have habitually engaged in illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing, Chinese officials pushed back on such claims by bringing Beijing-based diplomats on a guided tour of fishery facilities in the southeastern province of Fujian.

In combination with the report, NOAA handed China – alongside Mexico and Russia – a negative certification

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Published on
September 25, 2023

Singapore-based Karang Foodie, which specializes in upcycling food waste, has acquired feed company INSEACT. The all-equity deal will see 100 percent of INSEACT’s shares transferring to Karang’s control.

Amid rising global demand for alternative feed, as seafood companies seek to lower input costs and secure supply in the face of high fishmeal costs, there are also signs that high-interest rates are impacting the ability of firms to

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Published on
September 21, 2023

Faced with local government debt worsened by the Covid-19 pandemic, Chinese municipalities have been searching for sources of income and economic growth, leading the local government Harbin, a city in northeast China, to launch a new railway transport line to foster seafood trade with Russia.

A cold-chain railway connection between the port city of Vladivostok, Russia, and the inland city of Harbin will enable the neighboring nations, which have

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