The Chinese government has introduced an economic plan designed to wean the country off a reliance on exports and to increase domestic food production and consumption in the coming decade.
Published 15 December, 2022, the document, titled “Strategic Planning Outline for Expansion of Domestic Demand (2022-2035),” sets a goal of boosting domestic consumption to 50 percent of China’s GDP, repositioning the country away from a reliance on infrastructure spending to drive its economy.
The plan was designed as a response to efforts by key buyers of Chinese goods, including the United States, to decouple themselves from Chinese supply chains.
Chinese seafood exporters have complained that demand in key Western markets has diminished due to mounting inflation, which rose to its highest levels in 40 years in the U.S. and E.U. in 2022. Retail sales of seafood fell in the U.S. in 2022 as fresh fish prices rose 15.8 percent and frozen fish prices increased 10.9 percent, according to Spanish-based seafood trading house Interatlanctic. The E.U. seafood market also shrank in 2022, with total seafood consumption sinking below 10 million metric tons for the first time in years. Seafood consumption in the European Union has fallen by 27 percent over the last six years and Interatlanctic said it does not expect that trend to change.
The new plan in China is also intended to encourage Chinese citizens to spend and consume more. China’s population has relatively high levels of savings, partially in response to the country’s lack of a social welfare safety net and limitations in the education and health services it provides nationally. The plan calls for increased government spending on public welfare, but does not specify how the government will raise the funds to pay for that effort.
Already the world’s biggest seafood market, a surge in Chinese consumption would supercharge China’s clout as a seafood-consuming nation.
Photo courtesy of OSTILL is Franck Camhi/Shutterstock
