According to information from Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP), after 3 months of continuous decline, Vietnam's tuna exports to UK have increased again. In June 2024 alone, tuna export to this market increased by 56%, reaching 742 million USD.
However, VASEP said that the high growth rate in the past 2 months was still not enough to offset the previous decline. Therefore, cumulative export turnover to this market in the first 6 months of 2024 reached 3.6 million USD, down 5% over the same period. Frozen tuna meat/loins are still Vietnam's main export products to this market, accounting for 92%. Vietnam is currently the second largest non-EU source of frozen tuna meat/loins for the UK market, after South Korea.
In UK market, tuna is sold in many types of products such as raw, ready-to-eat, sushi, sauced, cake or breaded... Of which, canned and pouched tuna products are consumed the most. However, consumption of this product group has been on a downward trend since last year.
On contrary, consumption of sushi-style tuna or breaded tuna products tends to increase. Therefore, this is an opportunity for countries to increase export of processed and canned tuna products. However, in canned and pouched tuna market segment, Ecuador, Mauritius, Seychelles and the Philippines are four main suppliers to the UK market. Meanwhile, Vietnam is only a very small supplier.
According to VASEP, like Vietnam, Ecuador has signed a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with the UK. This is creating favorable conditions for this country to increase exports to the UK. With a powerful fleet, a plentiful supply of tuna of pure origin for Ecuador, Ecuador has many opportunities to boost exports to this market.
Meanwhile, Vietnam's catch is inherently much lower than that of its neighbor due to lower fishing capacity of the fleet. In addition, regulations limiting size of skipjack tuna allowed to be exploited are making output even lower. Therefore, VASEP expects that tuna exports to UK will find it difficult to maintain growth momentum until end of the year.

Source: Vitic/ congthuong.vn