March 31, 2009
Vietnam province faces possible catfish shortage
The Mekong Delta province of An Giang is seriously short of tra fish for export as the farming acreage has fallen by 29 percent and the Russian market, its major market, is recovering.
The price of tra for processing and export has been rising since early 2009 and now sits at between VND14,000 to VND16,200 per kilogramme depending on which category.
However, this is not much use to fish farmers as production costs almost equal the selling prices, which range from VND14,000 to VND14,500.
Meanwhile, fishermen face numerous difficulties such as a shortage of investment and not having signed contracts with enterprises, which makes them draw back from producing aquatic products.
Many processing plants have only been breaking even and have slowed down their operations.
To deal with this situation, An Giang plans to set up a tra and basa fish association to provide information on production and consumer demands for the sake of both businesses and aquaculture farmers.
In the first three months of 2009, An Giang exported 19,500 tonnes of frozen seafood, earning nearly US$47 million in total, down 48 percent in both volume and value from the same period last year.
US$1 = VND17,757 (Mar 31)
