As the Japanese seafood market struggles with decline, Nissui is planning to grow its operation through global expansion in a number of categories, including value-added seafood products, surimi, roe, fish oil and fish feed for aquaculture, and pharmaceutical components.
In a series of strategy documents describing the company’s intended trajectory until 2030, which it calls “Good Foods 2030,” Nissui said that it is shifting its focus broadly to “food solutions.”
The company said that it intended to expand its sales outside of Japan from the 2023 rate of 39 percent to 50 percent by 2030. This expansion reflects the expected decline of the Japanese market over the next five years.
The expansion of the company’s food products business would be tailored to specific markets, Nissui said.
“In Europe, we are acquiring and increasing production capacity with a strategy of expanding our sales area to generate continued growth. In North America, we are complementing our core fried white-meat fish products for household use and fried shrimp products for commercial use with a category expansion growth strategy that encompasses health category products and products for the Asian food market," the company said.
The North American expansion would include capital investments ennabling Nissui to become the leader in worldwide sales of fried white-meat fish.
The company said it would also place emphasis on products that responded to the interests of health conscious consumers and those motivated by convenience.
The company also plans to scale its aquaculture business through advanced breeding techniques, imporved feed, and digital transformation.
In a conversation with institutional investor Akihiro Shimoda, Nissui President and CEO Shingo Hamada said the company had reduced volatility through “the complementary relationship between operating profit in the Marine Products Business and Food Products Business."
“When the marine products market is in a downturn, lower selling prices push down profits for the Marine Products Business; conversely, in the Food Products Business, about 60 percent of our products use marine product raw materials, so the lower cost of raw materials is a factor that boosts profit," Hamada said.
Hamada also said the company had bounced back from overseas setbacks in the past by strengthening its risk management team while maintaining “an appropriate risk appetite” that would create opportunities for growth. Those first overseas investments also developed relationships that formed the core of the company's current international business, he said.
