Coming down or not?

Sorry for loss communication for a while due to I was away for business trip.
I’ve spoke to many people in both sale section and farmer, the hottest topic is will shrimp price stay sky high all year this year?

This month price will drop down for sure because Thailand has long national holiday which cause factory and peeling supplier stop operation (take holiday) also this month US government will visit shrimp operation to audit and make some investigation for labor issue. All peeling supplier (mostly in Mahachai area) will stop their operation in order to avoid labor issue with US government. As Mahachai area is well known for Burmese labor hiring. Demand is decreasing while supply is increasing. Farmer cannot wait as they want to make harvest before long holiday because leaving shrimp in the pond too long is very dangerous. Nobody knows what’s going to happen, better to make early harvest. According to these reasons, price will fall down 2 or 3 weeks or let say from next week till end of August.

After August, situation still very difficult to predict. Farmer from East of Thailand already start harvest which mean there will be no or very less supply from this area in next 1 or 2 months. But there’s good sign that Vietnam and China have better productivity, this can move some demand out from Thailand.

Southern of Thailand is still doing well. Only problem for this year is uniformity. Climate changing is one big problem for shrimp cultivation. As random check from the pond, uniformity is only one main problem. Nothing to worry about disease.

Still hope that price will drop down this year but very shortly period of time, 2 or 3 weeks for this month and hopefully in end September –mid November.

Why price in Thailand is so incredible high?

This is the question that many customers want to ask Thai packer “ Why the price is so high?”. Within 1 month, shrimp price increased almost 30% in some size which was the disaster for Thai packer. I had discussed with many shrimp gurus, auditors and R&D people who travel all over the world for shrimp business.

The main reasons that I summarize are as below;

1) Virus : The most scary name in this business have to be “IMNV”. This virus made many Indonesian farmers went bankrupt and believe it will take a year for them to recover.
2) Climate change : Reason should came from Elnino. Too hot temperature in Thailand caused slow growth rate, crop delay and low survival rate.
3) Crop delay and low productivity in Vietnam : The season should come by now but until today, we still not see anything yet. Also in China, a lot of shrimp die in first crop and hopefully good thing will come for the next crop (around next month).
4) High domestic demand in China : Not enough supply force Chinese to source more from Thailand and Vietnam.
5) Oil leaking in USA : Actually effect only 5% of total quantity but due to news that sometime much more over than the reality. Today US buyer move very fast and they can accept higher price in order to fulfill domestic market demand. US economy start to improve so more buying power will come in second half of this year.
6) Dirty game : there’s a rumor in the market that one big company who has main business in feed and fry is playing game with the market. By spreading news to farmer that shrimp price will go up until end of the year and ask farmer to delay harvesting. The result is farmers believe and buy more fry, putting more baby shrimp and buying more feed. This is the first benefit. The second benefit is when big company stops financing farmer, they have to sell all the shrimp to the market and if most of supply came to the market at the same time, price will go down very quick and at that time, that big company can buy raw material at very cheap price while order that they got in hand are very selling price.


In October, situation should be better for buyer and if you want to buy shrimp, buy now. If you can wait, wait until end October but don’t wait too long because price will go up again in winter, end of this year.

This is just my own opinion, good luck!!!

Is it a good time to buy shrimp from Thailand now?

To answer this question, I must say yes and no. Situation this year is very difficult to forecast due to many reasons affected such as IMNV at Indonesia and also unusual weather in Thailand.

IMNV in shrimp is disaster for Indonesian farmer, many farmers went bankruptcy because of this virus and this impact to market in South East Asia. Normally, EU or USA tend to buy big size (40 pieces /kg. or bigger) from Indonesia due to more competitive price compare to Thailand but after shrimp got infected, farmer have to make emergency harvest. The result was there were huge quantity of small shrimp came out from Indonesia and prices were very cheap. Make urgent harvest and sell at any price.

Come back to Thailand, this year is one of the hottest year. Temperature went up to more than 40°c which affect to water temperature and salinity. As mentioned in previous post, shrimp eat less, slow growth rate and difficult to control the size. No choice for farmer, they have to make urgent harvest. This is better than nothing, better than taking risk to continue feeding shrimp.


Price for small size started to drop down since mid of April and keep going down until now. Many buyers are wondering “is it a good time to buy shrimp from Thailand now?”. I can answer YES for small size from 60 pieces/kg. or smaller. Forecast that price is reach the bottom or very close to the bottom now and will rebound in next 1 or 2 month or let say that, buyer will get the best offer for small size during this month. For size that buyer have to wait is 45 pieces/kg. or bigger. Now price is around 4.5 – 4.8 USD/Kg based on head on. Forecast that price will go down to suitable level to buy around September (around 4.2 USD/kg or lower for 45 pieces/kg.). So don’t buy big size now, wait until last 4 months of the year.

Hope my comment can help. Good Luck!

*my price based on head on raw material price.

Bright future for Thai shrimp exporters

In 2010 Thai export will increase 8% due to Brazil and Indonesia still face “IMNV” problem (Infectious Myonecrosis Virus) while USA make less harvest because of oil leaking in Louisiana .

IMNV make shrimp eat less which cause them stop growing. Forecast this year Indonesia will export less 30% or 160,000 mt, compare to last year at 250,000 mt.



Oil leaking will force USA importer to import more shrimp and believe that quantity will be higher than last year.
In year 2009, Thailand exported around 180,000 mt .to USA while Indonesia exported 50% less, 90,000 mt.

For this year first quarter, Thailand can increase sale 34% compare to last year. Forecast that Thailand export will grow 8% and reach 350,000 mt. in volume or 2,500 million USD in value. The only obstacle for Thai is currency, Thai Baht strongly appreciate to both Euro and USD this year.

Down turn for Vientnam Pangasius???

Hello,

In year 2009 Vietnam exported Pangasius to 133 countries, 607,665 mt. or 1.34 billion USD. Main market was EU 6.9% and USA, Russia, Ukraine respectively.

Import value was decreased 5.2% in weight and 7.6% in value compare to year 2008 due to many reasons.

1) Economic crisis in main market, mostly in EU which lead to lower demand
2) Higher feed price
3) Higher oil price
4) Low standard of Vietnam packer which affect to consumer in Italy, Germany, Russia and Ukrainian.

Although Vietnam exported Pangasius to EU in high volume last year, this sale tend to be drop down due to many supermarkets require higher standard such as Global Gap.



Most of farms are small and farmers can not afford high expenditure to improve their farm standard such as water quality, farm landscape and inspection cost. Farmers have to pay 1,000 USD/day for inspector and after calculated, total cost to get Global Gap certified will be around 30,000 USD. This make Pangasius farmers turn to the rice field in 2010. Forecast that export sale for this year will decrease 50% and it leads to higher selling price.

Vietnam try to move to other markets which have less regulation such as Russia and USA but they also face the same problem because USA started to use "US Farm Bill 2008" on January 2010 to control quality of farm and standard of Pangasius packer.

However, Vietnam try to improve their farms. Some are on process of Global Gap certified. Beside, "Green Farms" organization was established to develop and improve quality of farm and packer in order to meet EU and USA standard.

High standard and new regulation are the new challenge of them...

Thai shrimp in April

Hello,

This is my first message to you. Shrimp report blog is mainly emphasize on update current shrimp situation in Thailand and also help sharing information in shrimp industry.

April
Shrimp price in Thailand is extremely high since January due to winter season. Shrimp is like a human, they don't like too cold or too warm water. During winter water temperature was drop which caused shrimp stop eating and of course, lead to low survivor rate. Normally farmer put only small quantity of fly in the pond or some even stop their business during winter.


Less survivor rate, less supply but demand still high. Packers still want high quantity to supply for Chinese new year in Feb. and also Japan and others in April, which lead to high shrimp price.

Raw material price start to drop down this month, April, because of unusual weather. Yes, it is summer but this year summer is very very hot. As mentioned previously, shrimp doesn't like too high temperature. Some start to eat less and farmer afraid that shrimp will die because of this reason so they make emergency harvest.

Supply came out to the market until end of the month and tend to be more on May.