After an intensely long and cold winter, China's tilapia production has dropped as much as 80 percent, forcing U.S. prices up as much as 20 percent, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization's "Tilapia Market Report" for April.
The FAO predicts that due to the supply situation in China, tilapia prices are likely to continue to increase sharply. Latin American countries like Ecuador, Costa Rica, Honduras and Brazil are expected to take advantage of the situation and ship increased quantities of tilapia at much higher prices to the U.S. market, and total U.S. imports are likely to decline for the remainder of the year.
Suppliers of other whitefish species, like catfish, many of which had been substituted by tilapia products in recent times, will also be able to take advantage of the situation with higher prices across the board. The slow expansion of tilapia supplies to the EU market that has been observed in recent months is forecast to come to a sudden end, says the report.
U.S. seafood prices are expected to rise by 2 to 3 percent this year due to increasing production costs. Wholesale prices fresh seafood prices are expected to increase by approximately 10 percent compared to the average price recorded last summer.
