The Gulf of Mexico oil disaster and shrimp diseases in other shrimp-exporting countries have become a boon for the Thai prawn industry which saw export prices to the US up 20% last week, following a 19% on-year rise to THB8.8 billion (US$268 million), according to the Thai Shrimp Association.

 

Association president, Somsak Paneetatyasai, said Thai prawns are now in high demand with a tendency of continuous increasing prices as a result of British Petroleum's oil drilling tragedy in the Gulf of Mexico which began in April, an incident which has already caused a 30% drop in the prawn harvest worldwide and has also dealt a blow to US produced prawn products.

 

As prawn consumption is still in demand in the US and consumers are worried about the safety of shrimp from the Gulf, Thailand could stand to benefit from the situation, as seen by increasing US orders for Thai shrimp imports, he said.

 

Last year, Thailand was the world's top prawn-exporting country with a total 390,000-tonne harvest, or about 21% of world shrimp exports.

 

The US was the largest consumer of Thailand's shrimp exports, with 190,000 tonnes (48% of overall purchases) imported to the country, amounting to THB45 billion (US$137 million) in 2009.

 

In addition, the US recently announced its decision to lower tax collections for Thai companies, which is a boon for Thai frozen prawn exports to the US market.

 

Meanwhile, shrimp produce of Indonesia and Brazil, the world's leading prawn producers, is facing a serious infectious myonecrosis (IMN) epidemic, causing their harvests to fall about 40-70%. Natural disaster in China, on the other hand, has made it hard for the country's prawn yield to meet its domestic demand.

 

Thai prawn farmers should take this opportunity to access new markets during this period when Thailand's main competitors have serious short supply of their own harvest, Somsak said.