Processing shrimps for export. — VNA/VNS Photo

HÀ NỘI — The Việt Nam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP) expects that shrimp exports will reach a turnover of US$5.6 billion by 2025, with an annual growth of 9 per cent.

Hồ Quốc Lực, former chairman of VASEP, said that the target was completely grounded, although the growth rate of 9 per cent per year would require hard work.

There was an assessment of the possibility of shrimp export turnover reaching $10 billion by 2025 in 2017, said Lực.

However, recent complicated developments showed that this level of striving was too high and inappropriate, he added.

Specifically, in terms of products, shrimp enterprises would flexibly penetrate each market according to their advantages and limit the strengths of their competitors, he said.

Regarding the market, he recommended enterprises determine to maintain the main markets including the US, Japan, and the EU, and at the same time focus on potential markets such as China, South Korea, the UK, Australia and Canada.

“The dynamism, flexibility and diligence of members in our shrimp value chain is an asset and a valuable advantage for the shrimp industry to make a breakthrough in the coming years. Not only will it exceed the set target, but it will also help the Vietnamese shrimp industry surpass two major competitors and rise to the top of the world in the near future," the former VASEP chairman told Tiền Phong (The Vanguard) newspaper.

With export turnover estimated at over $3.8 billion this year, a slight increase compared to last year, shrimp is still the key product of Vietnamese seafood exports.

Trương Đình Hòe, VASEP secretary general, said that the important factors that helped shrimp exports to remain successful this year were that Việt Nam has taken advantage of the opportunity when India and Indonesia were severely affected by the pandemic, high shrimp consumption, and a stable consumption market.

A report from VASEP also showed that Việt Nam was the world's largest shrimp exporter before 2015.

However, Indian shrimp had risen strongly since 2015 and Ecuadorian shrimp had made a breakthrough since 2018, making Vietnamese shrimp third in the world.

However, this gap between the top three was not much.

Specifically, among the annual value of $26-28 billion of shrimp imports worldwide, India accounted for 15.7 per cent, Ecuador accounted for 14 per cent and Việt Nam accounted for 13.6 per cent.

Việt Nam's shrimp farming area is over 740,000ha, and output is over 900,000 tonnes per year.

Vietnamese prawns rank first in the world with over 250,000 tonnes.

The main markets for Vietnamese shrimp consumption are the US (20-23 per cent), Japan (16-18 per cent), the EU (15-20 per cent), China (13-15 per cent) and South Korea (9-10 per cent).

Shrimp export turnover is about $3.8 billion per year, ranking third in the world after India and Ecuador.

In the past five years, Việt Nam's shrimp exports have grown by 5 per cent per year. Shrimp export turnover accounts for about 45 per cent of total seafood export turnover. — VNS