Bangladesh’s shrimp exports to the US market fell sharply by 76.10 per cent to $3.05 million in the first two months of the current financial year 2014-15 compared with that of the same period in the last FY as the US buyers are importing a low-price hybrid variety of the item from China, Vietnam and Thailand. Shrimp export earnings of Bangladesh from the US were $12.78 million in the July-August period of the FY14, according to the latest data of the Export Promotion Bureau.
Experts and exporters said the shrimp export earnings from the US witnessed a drastic fall in last couple of years due to the global economic meltdown.
After a continuous negative growth in the export earnings of shrimp from the US market in the last couple of years the earnings showed a positive sign in the FY14 but the export earnings in the first two months of the current FY registered further negative growth due to a hybrid item, they said.
The export earnings of shrimps from the US grew by 37.91 per cent to $49.25 million in the FY14 from $35.71 million in the FY13 while the previous financial years — FY11, FY12 and FY13 — witnessed continuous negative growth, the EPB data showed.
Shrimp export earnings from the US were $81.55 million in the FY11 and $51.78 million in the FY12.
‘Though our export to the US has rebounded in the FY14, the export earnings further deepened due to low-price hybrid shrimp namely “Venamy”,’ Kazi Belayet Hossain, vice-president of the Bangladesh Frozen Foods Exporters Association told New Age on Thursday.
He said the quality of the hybrid shrimp was lower than the Bangladeshi variety ‘Black Tiger’ but the US buyers were importing Venamy from China, Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia due to low prices.
Belayet said though the US economy had started to recover, the consumers were still preferring low-price product and the prices of hybrid shrimp were lower on average $2 per pound than the Bangladeshi items.
Despite declining trend to the US market the export flow of the item to the EU market remained steady and the earnings grew by 6.06 per cent in the first two months of the current FY.
The export earnings from shrimp totalled $115.73 million in the July-August period of the FY15.
One of the leaders of the BFFEA told New Age that they were thinking about market diversification and trying to explore market in Russia and China.
‘Russia has shown interest to import shrimp from Bangladesh as the EU imposed sanction on the country and the Bangladesh government has sent a list of 14 shrimp processing plants to Russia for their approval,’ the leader said.
-With New Age input
