Hanoi (VNA) – Though Vietnam has risen to one ofthe world’s top 20 ornamental fish exporters, the sector is still struggling torecover post-pandemic due to rising shipping costs.
Two thirds of ornamental fish farms in Vietnam are located inHo Chi Minh City which accounts for 62% of the country’s total exports of theproduct, according to the municipal Fisheries Sub-Department.
The 10,000sqm farm of the Sai Gon Ornamental CreaturesCo-Operative on the outskirt district of Cu Chi is one of them. Founded in2013, the 33-member co-operative exported more than one million fishes ofvarious species every month. Its month revenue stood at around 2.5 billion VND(106,700 USD).
Director of the co-operative Nguyen Van Thuy said the farmis cultivating dozens of species, including many high-value ones, such asdiscus, flower horn, freshwater angelfish and goldfish. Its biggest buyerscomprise the US, Japan, the Republic of Korea, Singapore, UAE, South Africa,India and several EU nations.
Before the COVID-19 broke out, Vietnam earned some 23-25million USD annually in turnover from exports of ornamental fishes. The figure droppedto just 15-17 million USD in 2020-2021 because of impacts of the pandemic.
As challenges were likely to linger on this year, the industry broughthome 6.5 million USD from January-June.
Exporters are redoubling efforts to enter new markets andexpand product diversity so as to recover to the pre-pandemic level.
Trinh Ngoc Hung, Deputy Director of Saigon Aquarium Corp.,one of the leading breeders and exporters of tropical freshwater aquarium fishin Vietnam, it is now the critical period for exporters to get ready for the peakseason. Since foreigners usually travel during the three-month summer, he said,sales tend to rise in the end of August as people purchase fishes toprepare for Christmas.
Lam Dieu Tai, manager of a farm in the Mekong Delta of LongAn, exporters are having a hard time as a result of a lack of internationalflights and rising shipping costs.
It cost about 4 USD per kg to ship consignments to the US in2020. The rate now increased to nearly 16 USD per kg, Tai said, adding that itis also not easy to merge orders sent to a same country for cost-saving likebefore./.