World shrimp trade steady on surge in Indian exports

India emerged as the top exporter with a 34% rise in sales volumes of 96,921 tonnes, followed by Ecuador

Indian exports have dominated the international shrimp trade in the first quarter of 2017, even as farmed shrimp production across the world remained low.

India emerged as the top exporter with a 34 per cent rise in sales volume at 96,921 tonnes, followed by Ecuador with sales at 93,370 tonnes, up 17 per cent.

“The lunar New Year celebration in January and February and spring festivals during April and May in East Asia kept the international shrimp trade steady during the first quarter of 2017, even though farmed shrimp production was seasonally low during the period,” said a report by Globefish, a unit within the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations.

The report Moderate and Positive Production Trends for Farmed Shrimp analysed the market situation until May 2017.

Exports from both the countries (India and Ecuador) to East Asian markets of Vietnam, Japan and China, as well as to the US increased during this period, it added.

Ecuador’s exports to the European Union (EU) were higher, supported by its duty-free status, despite a decline in total shrimp imports in the EU during the first quarter of the year compared with the corresponding period in 2016.

During the first quarter of 2017, shrimp imports faltered in the traditional western markets of the US (minus one per cent) and of the EU (minus six per cent) over the year-ago period. 

A strong Lunar New Year demand in the East Asian markets during January and February led to good trading during the first quarter of this year. There were higher imports in Vietnam, China (with direct imports from Canada, India, Greenland, and through border trade with Vietnam) and Malaysia, where local consumption remained high during January and February. 

Import trends were positive in Japan (five per cent rise), Canada (two per cent), Russian Federation (seven per cent), South Africa (13 per cent) during the reporting period over a year ago.

The report stated that current supplies of vannamei shrimp are dominated by India, where the full-scale harvests started in June and consisted of large sizes (13/15 and 16/20).

Indian vannamei production had reached 406 000 tonnes in 2016, with total harvest of farmed shrimp at 500, 000 tonnes.