Toan Dao has written about Vietnam’s business community, with a focus on energy and agriculture, for a number of Vietnamese and international outlets for more than 10 years. As a contributing editor for SeafoodSource in Southeast Asia, he also covers other major seafood producers in the region including Indonesia and Thailand.
Author Archive
Thai agribusiness conglomerate Charoen Pokphand Foods (CP Foods) has filed a lawsuit against the head of a civil society group over his allegations that its aquaculture operations caused the spread of invasive blackchin tilapia in Thailand’s waterways.
The case targets Witoon Lianchamroon, secretary-general of BioThai, who in a July 2024 seminar linked CP Foods’ Yi San Aquatic Research Center in Samut Songkhram province to the
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Vietnam’s pangasius exports have increased so far in 2025, fueled by surging demand from countries in South America, the ASEAN region, and the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), even as shipments to China and the U.S. weakened.
Vietnam’s pangasius sales in August increased 5 percent year-over-year to USD 200 million (EUR 170.5 million). The value in the first eight months of 2025 reached
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The Indonesian government has confirmed traces of radioactive Cesium-137 (Cs-137) detected in shrimp products were linked to a steel factory in an industrial zone in Banten province, but said the incident has not affected the integrity of the country’s seafood supply chain or exports.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration first issued an advisory that it detected Cs-137 in a shipping container at the ports of Los Angeles, Houston,
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Vietnam has asked the U.S. to review a decision that would block imports of seafood caught from 12 Vietnamese fisheries starting 1 January 2026, saying the move threatens exports and the livelihoods of hundreds of thousands of the country’s fishermen and factory workers.
NOAA informed Vietnam’s Directorate of Fisheries on 26 August that the fishing methods used in several of Vietnam’s fisheries were not deemed
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The Supreme Court of the Philippines has ruled that commercial fishing vessels are allowed to operate within the nation’s nearshore municipal waters.
In response, the country’s tuna industry and environmental groups are voicing concern that the ruling could threaten international sustainability certifications and, therefore, hurt exports.
The case stems back to October 2023, when the Mercidar Fishing Corporation filed a petition that
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The U.S.’s reciprocal tariffs on many shrimp-exporting countries are realigning global supply chains and forcing major Asian producers, including Vietnam, Indonesia, and India, to rethink their strategies.
India, the largest shrimp supplier to the U.S., faces the most severe impact from the newly implemented tariffs. The nation is currently subject to a 25 percent reciprocal tariff, which could jump to 50 percent on 27 August under a new
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Vietnam’s pangasius sector has adapted well so far amid the trade disruptions thrown at it this year, with leading exporters posting high profits on the back of early export pushes and aggressive cost-cutting during the second quarter of 2025.
According to the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP), pangasius exports in the first half of the year overall were worth just over USD 1 billion (EUR 878.5 million),
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Malaysia is pushing to strengthen its Fisheries Act in an attempt to combat illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing.
The Southeast Asian nation has in recent years been heavily targeted by IUU fishing, particularly by foreign vessels. Between 2020 and 2024, authorities documented 515 cases of foreign vessel intrusion in Malaysian waters, the New Straits Times reported, citing Malaysia Deputy Agriculture and Food Security Minister
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Fish stocks across the Philippines are shrinking as illegal fishing and decades of overexploitation are putting mounting pressure on the country’s marine resources.
A new analysis conducted by ocean advocacy nonprofit Oceana highlights that fish production from both commercial and municipal sectors in the Philippines has steadily declined since peaking in 2010.
Citing data from the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA), Oceana reported
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Samut Sakhon, Thailand-based food and beverage manufacturing company Thai Union reported profit growth in the second quarter of this year, even as it experienced a year-over-year sales drop in the period.
In its latest results report, the firm attributed its ability to still turn a profit amid the sales dip to strong cost discipline and improved gross margins in the face of persistent geopolitical and macroeconomic headwinds.
The company’s
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