China opens to import of Danish fishmeal

The Danish Embassy in Beijing has informed TripleNine that China has now permitted import of fishmeal from Denmark.

This news is reported by Yanqi Zhang Larsen, Business Development Manager of TripleNine, who has worked to achieve this opening of the Chinese market for a long time.

The Chinese market has been closed to import of Danish fishmeal and fish oil since 2001, as the Chinese feared the transfer of BSE due to the presence of bone meal in the fishmeal.

- So the fight which has now been won has lasted almost ten years, says Yanqi Zhang Larsen.

Potential partners have already been visited

Things really got moving after a delegation of Chinese food inspectors in September visited TripleNine in Thyborøn and Esbjerg as well as the other Danish factories.

In September, a delegation of Chinese food inspectors visited TripleNine in Esbjerg and Thyborøn together with representatives of the Danish Embassy in Beijing. Their report paved the way for the opening of the Chinese market.

- The delegation found our plants and all our safety procedures in perfect order. This greatly advanced our efforts to get permission to export our products to China, says Yanqi Zhang Larsen.

In anticipation of permission being granted, she and Christian Bisgaard, Managing Director of TripleNine, have already been to China to visit selected potential customers and partners.

- During our visit to China, I also participated in two important conferences about the Chinese market and that only reinforced my view that China is an incredibly important market with enormous potential, especially within the feed industry, where fishmeal is used primarily to produce feed for fish farming and piglet breeding, explains Yanqi Zhang Larsen.

Quality and environment

- It is a market with huge growth potential and a particular need for high quality fishmeal, emphasises Yanqi Zhang Larsen.

She reports that China imported 1.3 million tons of fishmeal in 2009 and is expecting to import about 1 million tons in 2010.

- We should have a good chance of entering and establishing ourselves on the market, Yanqi Zhang Larsen continues. - While the fishmeal imported today only has a protein content of 55-65 per cent, our fishmeal has a protein content of 72 per cent and is much more digestible.

- However, the fishmeal quality itself is not the only decisive factor, she adds. - Today, it is very important to the Chinese that production is environmentally correct and in that respect we definitely have an edge on our competitors on the world market.