Dar seafood ppp standard

Attachment 3

The Seafood Sector

1. Seafood sector
Seafood is an important part of the Australian diet. Domestic demand for seafood continues to grow: between 1991 and 1999, consumption of seafood in Australia increased by 12 percent (from 13.5 kg to 15.1 kg per capita)⁵¹. Australian households spend about 2.5 per cent of their food budgets on seafood products, which is about the same as expenditure on poultry⁵². The last few decades have also seen changes in the way Australians eat seafood, such as increasing consumption of sushi and smoked fish.
This increase in consumer demand is met to some extent by importing seafood products and by producing seafood through aquaculture. Approximately half of all seafood consumed in Australia is produced domestically and the other half is imported⁵³. This means that any proposed food safety management systems for the primary production sector must adequately address food safety for imported as well as domestically produced seafood and must take into consideration the increasing trend for seafood to be produced through aquaculture.
1.1 Consumer attitudes to seafood safety
Public health professionals advocate seafood in the diet as a means to address obesity and as a good source of omega-3 fatty acids⁵⁴. A study of consumer attitudes in Sydney and Perth found that the perceptions that fish is healthier than meat and that it adds variety to the diet were major factors influencing consumption. However uncertainty about safety and contamination, a lack of knowledge about seafood and high prices were major barriers to increased consumption⁵⁵.
The role of food safety systems is to minimise risks to public health, and in the process, to maintain consumer confidence in the food supply. Consumers have responded to outbreaks of food-borne illness in the past by reducing their demand for seafood. For example, following contamination of NSW bivalve molluscs in 1997, NSW consumers immediately reduced their demand for bivalve molluscs by 85 percent. They also immediately reduced their overall demand for seafood products by 30 percent, indicating that consumers readily generalise a specific seafood risk to all categories of seafood products⁵⁶. Consumers also tend to respond by expressing a lack of confidence in the capacity of industry and government to ensure food safety, a situation that may also impact on trade.
Other data, however, indicate that, despite a relatively short-term negative response to outbreaks of food-borne illness⁵⁷, there is solid demand for seafood over the medium term. For example, the share of seafood expenditure in household’s food budgets was similar in 1993-94 to the share in 1998-99⁵⁸, indicating solid demand for seafood over the medium term. This demonstrates consumers perceive the benefits of seafood consumption to be greater than any risks associated with its consumption. Nevertheless, short-term negative responses can last up to a year and have a significant impact on some seafood producers or sectors, highlighting the importance of consumer confidence as an important issue for industry and government.
1.2 Nature of the industry
The Australian seafood industry markets a diverse range of approximately 600 marine and freshwater seafood species. The Australian fishing zone is 11 million square kilometres, the third largest in the world. Despite the size of the fishing zone, Australia is ranked 52^nd in the world with respect to commercial tonnage. The industry ranges from tropical to sub-Antarctic, open ocean to estuarine, marine to freshwater, and operates in one of the world’s cleanest environments.
As the industry is geographically dispersed, it has a predominantly regional and rural workforce. In 2003, the Australian Bureau of Statistics reported 19 627 people directly involved in the wild catch, aquaculture, and processing sectors. Indirect employment in the commercial sector, and in compliance, transport, storage, wholesaling, and retailing, is considerably higher, and may approach 80 000 people⁵⁹. A more detailed analysis of the industry was included in the Initial Assessment Report, released for public comment in December 2002.
The volume of seafood harvested from the wild is limited by the capacity of fish stocks. Most stocks are fished at their optimum sustainable level and there is little capacity to expand wild catch volume⁶⁰. However, land and sea-based aquaculture is making an increased contribution to the seafood industry. Between 1991-92 and 2001-02, aquaculture produced approximately 24 percent of the total volume of seafood produced in Australia.
1.3 Value of the industry
The seafood industry is the fourth largest sector of the Australian food industry (by value) after beef, wheat, and milk. The gross value of production (GVP) during 2000-01 was estimated at $2.48 billion (adjusted figure)⁶¹. Since 1992, the GVP increased, on average, by 10 per cent per annum and aquaculture’s share has risen from 15 per cent to 30 per cent.⁶²

Most species cultured in Australia are high unit value species such as southern blue fin tuna, Kuruma prawns, bivalve molluscs and Atlantic salmon. A breakdown of production by the Australian commercial fishing industry is shown in Figures 1 and 2.

Figure 1: State shares of fisheries production, by value (ABARE, 2003)



F
igure 2: Australian seafood production (edible and non-edible), 2001-02 (ABARE, 2003)
1.4 Volume produced by the industry
Of the 186,677 tonnes of seafood produced in Australia during 2001-02, approximately 66 per cent (122,383 tonnes) was consumed domestically. During 2001-02, Australia imported 144,474 tonnes of seafood, mainly from Thailand and New Zealand (Figure 3b), which represents approximately half the total seafood consumed in Australia per annum (by volume). By value, imported seafood represented 77 per cent of the total value of seafood consumed in Australia.
Thirty four percent by volume of domestically produced seafood is exported. The major export markets were Japan, Hong Kong, United States, China, Chinese Taipei, and Thailand, with these six markets making up 82 per cent of the total export volume (Figure 3a).
Figure 3: Volume of Australian edible fisheries exports (a) and imports (b) by country (ABARE, 2003)

(a)

(b)

In terms of the value of seafood produced in Australia, exports represented 87 per cent of total production. This comparison reflects Australia’s position as an exporter of high value seafood species (e.g. rock lobster and abalone), with lower value species predominantly being traded in the domestic market.