The first item on the previous Minister for Primary Industries and Energy, John Anderson’s list of priorities for R&D corporations was "Identify strategic market access and investment opportunities based on improved access to international markets and to develop strategies to take advantage of these opportunities". The recently completed HIASM project is the only FRDC project to address this priority item. The project established a working relationship with the Supermarket to Asia Council and the new proposal will competently address the need identified by the Federal Government. The proposed project also addresses the FRDC program “industry development” and its key areas of “market development”, “value adding”, "quality and information delivery". The project will forge new links with the Supermarket to Asia (STA) program and will be the key link between STA and the seafood industry on a national basis.
The number of enquiries received by the project team on a wide range of species and products highlights the need for this project. The main needs that this project will address are:
* Keeping the Asian seafood market door open at a time when industry attention is temporarily diverted to such markets as USA and Europe.
* Overcoming the lack of industry expertise in marketing and lack of awareness of quality requirements in Asian markets.
* Adding value to under utilised and under valued species.
* Providing marketing information for other seafood projects.
* Generating interest in export markets.
* Providing a national seafood industry catalyst for quality initiatives and a focus point for marketing information for Australian under-utilised species.
* Providing a link with Supermarket to Asia programs and assisting with the uptake of these programs by the seafood industry.
* Providing a link with Asian trade exhibitions in order to increase seafood industry participation in these exhibitions.
* Increasing through-chain quality improvement by increasing the number of seafood companies with SeaQual Quality Food Australia accreditation.
* National co-ordination of marketing quality Australian seafoods.
* Revising awareness of Asian markets and their product and quality requirements.
* Developing a framework for how to do business in Asia included key marketing data on the Asian markets, competitor profiles and impediments to trade in the region.
The project team of the completed HIASM project also provided contacts from their in-market research to a number of companies or individuals that are pursuing markets for Australian seafood species. The knowledge gained from the project has already encouraged marketing efforts on lesser known but sustainable seafood species and will also encourage the harvesting of species that are currently not commercially viable in Australia. The HIASM project is the only marketing project with a national steering committee as a reference group that can assist in the expansion of markets for Australian seafood species.
The “Hooking into Asian Seafood Markets” project will work with SeaQual (Australia) in developing a SeaQual accreditation standards for the Australian seafood industry. The project will provide a conduit between STA and the seafood industry with respect to the project commercial operators and will assist with increasing the awareness of STA programs.
Final report
The Hooking into Asian Seafood Markets project was established to identify and facilitate the development of markets for Australian under- utilised seafood species, and to help industry operators to better understand the key opportunities and challenges that exporters need to consider in relation to exporting under-utilised seafood species to overseas markets.
The under-utilised seafood export guide is designed to help Australian seafood operators better understand the requirements of the Asian marketplace and could be used as a handbook for undertaking export development in Asian countries. It is aimed at those fishers and processors who want to export for the first time or who are relatively inexperienced in exporting. There is however also valuable information for exporters seeking to export new products or targeting new markets.
The export guide was aimed at adding value to Australian under-utilised species by investigating the demand for them in selected Asian seafood markets and identifying characteristics of these markets. In the long term, the adoption of the opportunities identified throughout the project has real potential to develop new export markets. The challenge for exporters is to match their capability to supply under-utilised Australian seafood products with the specific requirements of the various Asian seafood markets.
