Government cash is fueling a battle between local governments in China keen to establish dominance in the tuna-processing industry.
Imports of tuna recorded by Fujian Province rose from 750 metric tons (MT) in 2020 to 9,260 MT in the first half of 2021, according to data presented by Long Yang of Shandong Ocean International at the Tuna Vigo 2021 conference recently. Long suggested that overall domestic consumption of tuna in China is rising faster than demand from Western buyers for canned or semi-processed tuna.
Long home to a largely privately-owned fishery sector (in contrast to many state-owned peers in Shandong and Zhejiang provinces), Fujian looks set to compete for global tuna catches with established players like Shandong Province’s Rongcheng, which has a tuna-processing sector led by Xinfa Holdings, a conglomerate with fishing, processing, and shipbuilding interests globally and a focus on yellowfin tuna.
The most aggressive expansion is taking place in Fuzhou, the capital of Fujian Province, where local government has announced it has completed the port berths in the Lianjiang National Distant-Water Fishery Base. The base is being built at a cost to-date of CNY 2.3 billion (USD 345 million, EUR 299 million). This has been scaled up from an original CNY 1.5 billion (USD 210 million, EUR 195 million) investment on a 336-hectare site.
The base is the third in China to be given the status of National Distant-Water Base, after bases in Zhoushan, in Zhejiang Province, and Rongcheng, according to a document local government document.
Among the firms operating from Fuzhou are Fuzhou Hong Dong Pelagic Fishery, which has plants and vessels in Guyana and Mauritania, and Pingtan Marine and its subsidiaries Fujian Provincial Pingtan County Ocean Fishing Group Co., or Pingtan Fishing, as Pingtan Marine’s vessel-operating subsidiary company is known.
More development is likely coming to Fuzhou, after a local task force announced that, by 2028, a cluster of related industry parks will be built around the port. These parks will include processing facilities for squid, tuna, and other seafood and related byproducts, as well as trading and a distant-water fishing equipment industrial park.
Communist Party Secretary Lin Bao Jin said in a local government statement that the government is backing the new distant-water port as part of a broader “Fuzhou on the Sea” marketing vision, which envisions the city becoming a hub for the manufacturing of wind-energy equipment and “new materials” produced at large local refineries.
China’s increased efforts to deleverage its economy are showing. While the Fuzhou party secretary referred in his statement to Fuzhou as a “Silk Road City,” there appears to have been a cooling off on earlier embraces of the Belt and Road Initiative, a government blueprint that has been used as a free-for-all by many regional governments to launch big infrastructure projects. Though the BRI originally envisioned Chinese investments into ports and infrastructure to increase Chinese trade, the program has received some criticism lately after some recipient countries have struggled to repay related loans.
Photo courtesy of Zhong Nong Modern Agricultural Development Co.
