New book helps seafood suppliers target Hong Kong market

August 18, 2016

Seafood suppliers in Alaska and nationwide have an important new resource for marketing their catch to Hong Kong and Chinese markets.

"Synopsis of the Hong Kong Seafood Market," published by Alaska Sea Grant at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, provides a comprehensive analysis of the Hong Kong seafood market and valuable information on products favored by Hong Kong consumers and buyers. Hong Kong is important because it is a major importer of U.S. seafood products and is representative of the market in China, particularly Southern China.

The book includes more than 90 tables, with market information ranging from broad data on Hong Kong seafood imports to the top countries from which Hong Kong imports the seafood groups. Information includes import volume and dollar value of fish, shellfish and mollusks such as snails, squid and octopus. The book covers product categories such as fresh or chilled fillets, whole shellfish, and dried, salted, smoked or otherwise processed products.

The city-state of Hong Kong is smaller than Rhode Island, with a population of about 7.3 million. But the dollar value of food consumption in Hong Kong is significant. Residents and visitors spent $22.23 billion for food consumed at home and at prepared-food venues in 2015.

Author Quentin Fong, a seafood marketing specialist with the Alaska Sea Grant Marine Advisory Program at UAF, is a fisheries economist. Fong was born and raised in Hong Kong, and his family has been in the import-export business there for three generations.

Fong’s coauthor, Qiujie Zheng, is an assistant professor of economics at the University of Alaska Anchorage who studies consumer preferences for Alaska salmon and other seafood in China. The two decided to pool their knowledge to examine the Hong Kong and China seafood market.

Seafood suppliers in Alaska have shown increasing interest in the potential for marketing to Hong Kong and China. Fong and Zheng’s book will serve as an introduction to the Hong Kong seafood market. It can help a seafood supplier in the United States decide whether to enter that market and with which kind of product.

Alaska Sea Grant is a statewide marine research, education and outreach program housed at the UAF School of Fisheries and Ocean Sciences. Alaska Sea Grant is funded by NOAA in partnership with the State of Alaska and private industry.

FOR MORE INFORMATION: Quentin Fong, qsfong@alaska.edu, 907-486-1516

ON THE WEB: https://seagrant.uaf.edu/bookstore/pubs/MAB-68.html