Ireland’s food promotion agency is taking a Chinese buying mission to visit Irish seafood facilities in April 2018, in an effort to increase already fast-growing sales to China.
The announcement was made by James O’Donnell, Bord Bia representative in China, during the recently concluded China seafood fair in Qingdao.
The Irish pavilion at the fair scored a major publicity coup by being visited by China’s top fisheries official, Yu Kangzhen. A deputy minister at the agricultural ministry, Yu was escorted by O’Donnell and the Irish ambassador to China as he surveyed the 12 Irish companies at the fair.
Among the companies Kangzhen talked with was crustacean specialist Rockabill. Based outside Dublin, the firm supplies both Sunkfa and Xiangxian – major seafood importers in Beijing and Shanghai, respectively.
Kangzhen also visited with representatives from Atlantic Dawn, an operator of trawlers, with large shipments of mackerel to China. Ireland shipped EUR 36 million (USD 42 million) worth of shellfish to China in 2016, up 13 percent year-on-year.
