Chinese seafood firm Shanghai Hecheng Food, which also operates under the name Hi-Chain, has launched two new seafood brands on a bet that that demand for premium seafood products will steady in China.
Hecheng used the occasion of the World Seafood Shanghai (SIFSE) exposition to launch the Norway Fishing Ground brand alongside representatives from Norcod, its supplier for the products. Norcod operates a commercial-scale cod farm located close to Trondheim, Norway.
Norcod CCO Chris Guldberg told SeafoodSource that Chinese consumers are ready to embrace cod in the same way they did salmon, which is continuing to grow in China.
“We firmly believe the brand we launched with Hi-Chain is an important step in terms of growing the Chinese market,” Guldberg said. “Our Snow Cod is marketed and sold in the same way as salmon, and both Norcod and Hi-Chain believe that the long-term potential equals that of the salmon market. Just like salmon, our product is versatile and fresh, perfect for grilling, baking, and enjoying raw in sushi and sashimi. Just like salmon, we can provide customers with stable and reliable deliveries of a high-quality product all year round.”
This launch follows a cooperation agreement Hecheng signed with Norcod in late 2023 at an event in Shanghai, aiming to position cod at the premium end of the Chinese market with marketing support from the Norwegian Seafood Council in China.
Hecheng’s Polar Sea Crab brand, meanwhile, features crab supplied by Hooper Islands, Maryland, U.S.A.-based firm Phillips Foods and Vladivostok, Russia-based Sigma Marine Technology, the latter of which has long supplied Chinese seafood-processing factories.
Hecheng’s American supplier of crabs is, like Norcod, also optimistic about sales in China.
Suppachok Meesubwattana, sales director at Phillips Foods Asia, told SeafoodSource that Hi-Chain will be the company’s first Chinese customer for blue swimming crab.
“We are working on our first shipment and [looking forward to] seeing how business can expand together,” she said.
Meesubwattana said the company expects to sell USD 3 million (EUR 2.7 million) of products to China this year. She also said the company expects this to be just the beginning of Phillips’ partnerships with Chinese companies.
“With this first customer in China, we expect more sales or to gain interest from another customer in China,” she said.
Hi-Chain is taking a gamble on the premium market in China holding up, but other companies aren't convinced that China is ready to steadily embrace new premium products, particularly with the cod launch.
The market for premium Atlantic cod is very limited in China, said Fan Xubing, CEO at Seabridge, a seafood marketing consultancy in Beijing.
“Chilled or fresh cod is not fresh salmon, and there is not a major application [of this species] in China,” Fan said, adding that weak consumer sentiment has forced China’s salmon suppliers to cut prices in order to retain market share.
Norcod’s Guldberg thinks it will take time to develop the market but is still bullish on the prospects.
“We need to raise awareness and create demand, and that is why Hi-Chain, Norcod, and The Norwegian Seafood Council are working closely together to develop the market through a range of marketing activities,” he said. “We have to bear in mind that the market conditions in China are challenging given the economic downturn. Despite the downturn, things are looking promising and I firmly believe that China will be one of our most important markets in the years to come.”
Norcod’s Danish parent company Sirena has a long history in China, where it has numerous partnerships with local processors supplying whitefish. With a processing facility at Hengsha International Port near Shanghai, Hecheng has the infrastructure to readily supply China’s affluent east coast.
