Online transaction floor expected to give strong boost to shrimp industry

ABO/NDO – Vietnam’s first online shrimp transaction floor has been launched recently, at http://cnsv.vn, involving the participation of shrimp farmers, sellers, processing businesses and providers of juvenile shrimp and food. The inception of the floor aims to limit and move towards eliminating the intermediary stage and directly connect farmers and purchasers of material shrimp.

Shrimp harvesting in the Mekong Delta region.

Accordingly, farmers will provide information on the batch of material shrimp that they want to sell to be “listed” on the floor. When there are buyers with similar needs to the sale information, the floor administrators will connect the two sides to negotiate the harvesting and transportation process, and even adjust prices based on the actual size of the material shrimp. The final prices will be reported to the trading floor and announced publicly, so that it can be used as a reference for other buyers and sellers.

In recent years, the shrimp industry has always contributed a great share of the export revenues of Vietnam’s seafood sector. Shrimp farming has also helped many households to escape poverty and rise to make money sustainably. However, the shrimp industry is also facing many challenges, especially market volatility and uncertain prices, forcing shrimp farmers into hardship and even bankruptcy. There are many moments when processing and exporting enterprises have fallen into a shortage of production materials, failing to meet the contracts signed with importers. Not to mention, the quality of farmed shrimp has also become a hot issue recently, particularly the problems related to impurities and antibiotic residues in material shrimp.

In that context, the introduction of the online shrimp transaction floor is expected to create new transformations for shrimp production and consumption. Specifically, the disclosure of parameters on shrimp farming areas and shrimp quality will help farmers become more aware right from the stage of selecting breeds and feeds, and strictly comply with the production process. When selling their products, shrimp farmers will be able to find “reference” prices through the floor in order to avoid disadvantageous prices as proposed by traders as previously. As for buyers, they will be informed about the product quality and prices to quickly select the most suitable batches.

In the long term, through the activities on the trading floor, state management agencies will have a practical basis on which to orientate and direct localities to produce shrimp in line with the market demand, towards signing contracts between buyers and sellers on the transaction floor, thus helping farmers feel secure to invest in shrimp production and lead a stable life with shrimp farming.

(Source: NDO)