Chinese tilapia suppliers are starting to make major headway into alternative markets, including several in the Middle East, according to a special investigation done by a prominent show on the country’s largest state-owned television network.
The Chinese government’s signature “One Belt, Two Roads” foreign policy plan, which calls for strengthening China’s transport links with central and southern Asia, as well as the Middle East and Europe, in order to boost Chinese exports, is having an outsized effect on tilapia firms, according to a report by CCTV Evening News.
Huang Jin Liang, general manager of Hainin Province-based Hainan Wenchang Jin Shan Tilapia Breeding Co., told the show that new air and shipping routes created as part of the “One Belt, Two Roads” plan have helped him find new markets. Huang said he is now he shipping 90 percent of his tilapia to Iran and Israel.
“Prices and demand are both good in these markets,” Huang said.
CCTV reported that more than 30 new or reinstated air and shipping routes have been opened out of Hainan Province as part of the “One Belt, Two Roads” program. Those include new connections to Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia and Vietnam, as well as further afield to Kazakhstan and Russia.
