The Ministry of Agriculture delegation that is currently on a market scoping mission in the United States of America (US) had the opportunity to visit key agricultural product distributors located in the west coast of California, Sacramento, San Francisco and Oakland this week.
Head of delegation and Ministry of Agriculture acting Permanent Secretary, Uraia Waibuta said that the major importers of the Fijian products live in the California state, Los Angeles (LA) City because of the air freight goods that go through the LA Airport.
“This is also the same for sea freight goods that go through the Port of Los Angeles and Port of Long Beach. The first arrival destination for imported goods is LA,” Mr Waibuta said.
“Other Key importers live in Sacramento and in the Bay Area of San Francisco, Oakland and Hayward City because of the close proximity to the Oakland Port facility where other sea freight goods from Fiji are cleared.”
According to the Fiji Trade Commissioner in Los Angeles, Mr Jitendra Singh, Fiji’s exports into the US amounted to US$31.6 million which is a decline of 34.4 percent on annual basis.
“While the decline in exports was broad-based across most categories, lower export of tuna was the main driver of the decline in the first quarter. During the same period, Fiji's imports from the US rose to US$19.8 million, from US$16.6 million in the same period in 2013. Cumulative to March 2014, Fiji recorded a trade surplus with the US valued at US$11.8 million; this was lower than the US$31.6 million surplus recorded in the same period of the previous year,” Mr Singh said.
The Fiji Trade Commissioner highlighted that there are a number of factors that impede the competitiveness of our products in the US markets.
“One of the crucial ones is the freight cost to the US which is quite high,” he said.
Fiji’s fresh products like Taro, Cassava and yams and dry goods are competing strongly on price with products from Mexico, Costa Rica and other Asian countries.
These countries, according to Mr Waibuta because of their geographical location close proximity to the US, can land their product at ports more cheaper than Fiji.
He said that this is the reality for all Fiji products that are exported to the US and it is crucial that Fiji focuses its effort in developing value-added products.
“However, our comparative advantage is quality; all our Products are sold under Fiji brand which is liked by the American consumers.”
Mr Waibuta stated that most our products targeted the Pacific Diaspora community in the US, however there are some canned Fijian products that are sold in the Whole Food Markets.
America is a potential exports market for Fiji given that steady increases in the Pacific Island population who have now resided in the US over the last five (5) years. Limited volumes of Fiji taro exported to the US market accounts to only 10 % of the total exports volumes of fresh produce exported to our overseas market that include New Zealand and Australia.
Mr Waibuta said that they have noted with concern some of the pertinent issues raised by the key importers they had met with.
“The consistency in supply of fresh products, quality of the products that enters the borders sometimes is a concern and the Ministry will definitely work with various councils and agencies within Government to address it.
“There is a crucial need to increase our fresh product exports to the US, in that we need to ascertain the level of market demand of our fresh produce in US and analyzing cost implication involve in pre and post boarder on exporters it is therefore important for government to have a first-hand information on this issue,” Mr Waibuta said.
He stated that the Fijian Government setup an Incentives Package with the aim of encouraging increased investments in export businesses.
“Joint ventures are highly encouraged to stimulate local entrepreneurship. The Ministry of Agriculture will continue to support private exporters in Fiji who are exporting Agro products to the US; however the Ministry will also ensure that all issues raised by importers will be addressed appropriately.”