Chinese tilapia remains in favor with African buyers, despite efforts to increase local production.
Papa Tilapia Imports in Abidjan, the capital of Ivory Coast, is seeking suppliers in China to meet rising local demand, according to the company’s owner, Salumba Sheriff.
Sheriff said he’s currently buying from a company in Vietnam, but is shopping around for better deals. He told SeafoodSource he wants to buy 15 to 20 forty-foot containers of Chinese tilapia per month.
This shows the continuing demand for Chinese imports despite several government- and NGO-assisted efforts to build a domestic tilapia industry. For example, the Société d'élevage et de Distribution de Poisson (SEDP), which was set up in 2014 to produce tilapia in cages on two freshwater lakes, has struggled to increase volumes due to a lack of locally produced feed. The cooperative is forced to import feed from Ghana, adding to its costs.
Federal import taxes on tilapia arriving in Ivory Coast is 10 percent on the cost and freight value of the container. Despite its location on the Atlantic Ocean, the Ivory Coast imports 250,000 metric tons (MT) of seafood per year. Local tilapia output has been flat at 3,000 MT for the past several years.
With a population of 24 million, the Ivory Coast has been a key market for Chinese tilapia exports into Africa. But local efforts to expand output have struggled to replicate the success of tilapia farmers in China, who benefit from government-funded supports. And much of China’s tilapia is produced within short trucking distance of major international ports like Guangzhou and Haikou.
Photo courtesy of BOULENGER Xavier/Shutterstock
