India has emerged as the largest exporter of shrimp  to the US market, for the first time in the history of seafood trade, in 2013. Overtaking Thailand, India had shipped 94,000 tones of shrimp to USA valued at US $1 billion.

Roughly 50% of India’s total shrimp export was to USA. Now India became eighth largest exporter of food items, including Spices and Seafood, to the United States.

A J Tharakan, National president of Seafood Exporters Association of India (SEAI) told Business Standard that Thailand had a setback in the  roduction of shrimp in 2013 due to the heavy  onslaught of a diseace  called Early Mortality  Syndrome (EMS).

Fortunately Indian aquaculture   farms are rather safe and production increased harply. This helped India to supply more shrimp to the US market  uring  last year. Aquaculture production in Thailand dipped roughly 50%  owing to the spread of EMS. 

He said that the premium quality of Indian shrimp also attract importers in the US market. In her recent visit to India,  Dr. Margaret Hamburg, The  United States Food and Drug Commissioner informed  that the US authorities are generally happy with the  quality of seafood India was shipping to the US.

In  a discussion with Tharakan, the US FDA officials accompanied her said that the Indian seafood  sector  made good  efforts to comply to the US FDA import  requirements, over the years. This helped the   export sector to reap the opportunity in the US market.

"Our seafood exports to the US are being treated fairly by the FDA and we have no major issues on the inspection procedures followed by FDA for seafood imports, he said. However, he informed the delegation that when consignments are sampled for inspection some times it takes up to 45-60 days for results are known and  containers to be released."

This creates substantial financial stress for both the exporter and the US importer. The FDA team informed that they would take up the issue seriously. Apart from this the Indian exporters have a fairly good treatment from the US authorities. This also helped to increase the shrimp exports to USA.

Withdrawal of the Countervailing Duty (CVD) and lowering of anti-dumping duty also helped India to do more business with the US. During 2005-2010, India’s export to USA had been affected very badly due to imposition of anti-dumping duty. Later imposition of CVD also irked business with the US. Now CVD is removed and anti-dumping duty is at a minimum level,

So exporters have some relief in  doing business with that country, he added. However, he  expressed concern over CVD issue as an appeal  had been filed against the decision of US Department  of Commerce (DoC).

Talking to Business Standard Tharakan said that global shrimp prices had increased heavily and further increase likely to be a remote possibility. In India raw material cost for shrimpexports had increased to a level of Rs 600/Kg. So further hike in export price may affect our business with USA. Already consumer resistance is so strong in markets like USA and Europe, he said.

Source: business-standard

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