The Southern Shrimp Alliance (SSA) is asking the U.S. Forced Labor Enforcement Task Force (FLETF) to add Rongcheng Sanyue Foodstuff to the U.S.’s Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act’s (UFLPA) entity list – a move which would effectively ban the import of any product from the company.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) added seafood to its list of priorities in the UFLPA in July 2024 – the first addition to the list of high-priority sectors since 2022. The addition signaled the DHS considers seafood as being at a higher risk of utilizing forced labor or state labor transfers of Uyghurs or other ethnic minorities from the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.
The UFLPA was established in 2021 and makes importing any goods produced with Uyghur labor or labor from China’s Xianjiang region illegal.
The DHS has already added some companies to the UFLPA. In June 2024, it added Shandong Meijia, also known as the Rizhao Meijia Group, as well as its subsidiaries Rizhao Meijia Aquatic Foodstuff and Rizhao Meijia Keyuan Food Co., to the list.
Now, the SSA is pushing DHS to add Rongcheng Sanyue, pointing out publicly available information indicates the company is refusing to allow U.S. government officials access to its facilities in China.
Rongcheng Sanyue is already listed on the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Import Alert 99-32 list – which refers to companies whose goods will be detained without examination due to refusing FDA inspections. Per the FDA, the company has been listed since 28 June 2023, which effectively means any goods imported from Rongcheng Sanyue will be immediately detained until the importer or manufacturer can prove the violation has been corrected.
“Despite being prohibited from exporting shrimp to the U.S. market, the West Coast Division of the FDA reported refusing an entry line of shrimp shipped by Rongcheng Sanyue in September of this year,” the SSA said. “Bills of lading data indicate that the goods description for this shipment was ‘frozen Argentine red shrimp HLSO, easy peel.’ Moreover, bills of lading data indicate that Rongcheng Sanyue has exported at least another three containers of Argentine red shrimp to U.S. ports since the FDA refusal.”
In a letter the SSA sent to the FLETF, the association pointed out that Rongcheng Sanyue has continued to promote and advertise its products and attempted to sell them to the U.S. According to SSA, a review of bill of lading data indicates the company has tried to send additional containers of Argentine red shrimp to the U.S., naming Pecheries Oceanic Fisheries as the consignee.
Pecheeries Oceanic Fisheries was one of the companies named in an Outlaw Ocean Project report due to its connections to Chinese companies and vessels suspected of using Uyghur labor. The report, published in October 2023, kicked off heightened scrutiny of Chinese seafood imports and lead U.S. companies to halt doing business with certain suppliers.
Including the company on the UFLPA entity list could help stop those attempts to ship products to the U.S. and “ensure that the company does not benefit from egregious flaunting of U.S. law and violating basic principles of human rights,” the SSA said.
“Rongcheng Sanyue has prohibited our government from inspecting its processing plant but still sells seafood into the U.S. market,” SSA Executive Director John Williams said. “If anyone in our industry told the FDA to take a hike, that company would be immediately shut down. But, for Rongcheng Sanyue, blowing off the FDA has allowed the company to conceal any benefit obtained from the Chinese government’s oppression of the Uyghur minority without consequence.”
