December 4, 2008

Taiwan's food conglomerate, Uni-President Group, plans to build two shrimp farms in Vietnam in order to supply young shrimp to Vietnamese producers.

The company's target is to supply 4 billion young shrimps to Vietnamese shrimp farms each year, after beginning operations of the new shrimp farms, said spokeswoman Wu Hsu-hui.

Vietnam's demand reaches 25 billion young shrimp per year. About 75 percent of farmed shrimp come from Asia, and Vietnam is the world's third largest shrimp exporter after China and Thailand.

The group opened its first shrimp farm in Vietnam in April, and produces 1 billion shrimp per year, said Wu.

Wu said Uni-President was attracted by Vietnam's advanced aquaculture and its low labour cost.