Argentina is expecting “a lot more” investment from China in its fishing companies, according to an official from the country’s fisheries ministry.
Chinese investment is “very good” for Argentina, according to Pablo Andres Drach, a spokesman for the fisheries sub-secretariat at the Argentine agricultural ministry. “They [Chinese] see they can work with us. We need more investment in our fisheries.” Drach believes the investment will help Argentina increase the quantity and value of its annual catch which has, he says, doubled in the past three years. The volume of the Argentine catch rose 37 percent in the first half of 2014, while the value of the catch was up 18 percent, according to Drach.
China meanwhile will in the coming year become Argentina’s top two market for seafood after Spain, according to Drach. Six of the 12 Argentine companies exhibiting at this year’s Asia seafood expo in Hong Kong focus on shrimp. “
While welcoming Chinese investment, the Argentine government has also become more wary about protecting resources by for example preventing vessels from entering key shrimp breeding zones. Likewise since 2008 there’s been a major improvement in real-time monitoring of vessels fishing in Argentina’s exclusive economic zone. “We are very conscious to control the resources to ensure they remain sustainable.”
Access to alternative sources like Ecuador, Venezuela and India means “it’s more important for us to keep China as a customer than for the Chinese to keep us,” says Ciro d’Antonio, head of sales at Frigorifico del Sud Este, which ships shrimp to China.
Chinese demand is a boon for Argentina, says d’Antonio. China’s expanding footprint in Argentina meanwhile doesn’t worry firms like his, he says: he explains how the Chinese are allowed focus on lower valued species like squid, which is “not so economical” for Argentine companies to harvest and process themselves.
State owned Shanghai Jinyou Deep Sea Fisheries Co. earlier this year completed the purchase of Altamare, a shrimp and fish catcher/processor in Puerto Madryn, a city of about 70,000 people in the province of Chubut in the Patagonia region.
Part of the state-run Shanghai Fisheries General Corp. conglomerate, Jinyou paid USD 21.5 million (EUR 16.5 million) for the Argentine firm in a statement published on the Shanghai Fisheries Bureau website which also declared Shanghai Jinyou sees the purchase as part of the company’s strategy to “go global” and buy fishing companies and resources around the world.
