Phuoc Tien General Trading Company: A taste of dried seafood snacks

IN MANY western countries, the thought of sitting down with friends on a Saturday afternoon with a cold beer in hand and ordering dried octopus, dried baby shrimp or dried leather jacket (filefish), to go with the amber fluid, is not something most people would consider. However, when looking at the same scenario in a number of Asian cultures, this is exactly what you would expect to see. Whilst the consumption of western-style snack foods such as chips (crisps) and other extruded snack food products is rapidly growing in Viet Nam, and most parts of Asia, the market for the more traditional style snack foods such as dried seafood, is flourishing.

On his visit to Da Nang city in the central region of Viet Nam recently, Anthony Evans of FoodPacific Manufacturing Journal came across a company that still produces snack food products that cater to the more traditional Asian palate.  Phuoc Tien General Trading Company that specialises in dried seafood products. In this exclusive interview, Anh Tuan Do, president of Phuoc Tien, talks about the company, its products and the challenges they face trading in the Asian food market. 

Mr Anh Tuan Do, president, Phuoc Tien General Trading Company

Could you tell us more about the company’s history and the range of snack food products?

We started operations in a modest way in 1995, but grew rapidly over the next five years. It was one of those situations that some businesses experience where the growth seemed to have had its own momentum. Phuoc Tien produces a range of dried seafood products for the snack food market, items such as dried leather jacket, a range of dried squid and baby squid products, dried octopus, dried shrimp and anchovy, dried anago, sea bream, mamakari and flying fish, and we also do some other products such as frozen stingray slices, frozen blue swimming crab, shark fin and even product such as shrimp powder and canary birds’ nests.   

Where is the company located, and what is the size of your operations?

Our head office is based in Da Nang in central Viet Nam, with factories along the coast in Quang Binh province. We did have a strong presence down south in Ho Chi Minh City and Vung Tau for some time but we closed that part of our operations when the company went through a period of downsizing a couple of years ago. As a lot of businesses know, sometimes bigger doesn’t always translate into greater profits, and although we still have a presence in Ho Chi Minh City, nearly all of our processing facilities are located here in central Viet Nam. Presently we have around 500 employees across all of our operations.

With regards to the sale of your products, is Phuoc Tien’s focused predominantly on the domestic market, or is the regional and international markets part of the company’s sales strategy?

Our domestic market sales is only very small, making up about 10% of our total sales, with the other 90% going to Japan, and we service some very large food retailers such Lotte Mart. We’re very comfortable with the level of sales we’re experiencing at the moment, and to be honest, selling our product is not the problem, but accessing the seafood stock is more of a challenge. As the seafood industry is always at the mercy of Mother Nature, our production is dependent on availability of the raw materials, but saying that, we’re always able to expand production when the conditions are right.

Raw seafood undergoes drying

Staying on that point; do you see the availability of the seafood you process going up or down?

At the moment I would say we’re looking at a decrease in supply, but there are a number of issues we face here in Viet Nam relating to this problem. The fact that we don’t process seafood caught too close to the coast for hygiene and health reasons limits availability, and then this problem is compounded even further by the ongoing difference of opinion with China over disputed territory in the East Sea (South China Seas). However, I know enough about business to understand that when a company is faced with problems, blaming circumstances is not the way to go. I think the expression you use in English is, “when the going gets tough, the tough get going”, and I’ve never been the type to shy away from a challenge so I don’t think I’ll start now, but the reality is the raw materials are getting harder to come by.

What’s the company’s strategy to take it into the future, particularly with the issues you mentioned regarding supply of suitable seafood to process?

Here at Phuoc Tien, we’re presently going through a product research and development stage and looking at other raw materials that would be complementary to our present product line, and which of course would offer an abundant and consistent supply. Some of the fruit and vegetable varieties suitable for drying have got our interest at the moment and with the growth in popularity of the western-style snack foods such as chips and exuded snack products we’re also exploring these type of options as well, but a lot of this development is reliant on investment, which is still hard to come by here in Viet Nam. We should have a clearer understanding of our product development options towards the end of the year, and after some product trials and our market research has been completed.

Dried seafood snacks include flying fish, baby squid, and shrimp

How would you describe the competitiveness of the Vietnamese food processing sector you operate in?

Well, that’s an interesting question, and not an easy one to answer. Generally speaking, our product is snack foods, but it’s traditional Asian-style snack food which is a sector largely ignored by the large companies operating in the manufacture of western style snack foods, biscuits and confectionery, which makes us a bit of a niche market. And as most of our products are purchased by just a couple of large overseas food retailers, we don’t really concern ourselves with looking over our shoulder when it comes to the competition. However, when we talk about competing with other companies over the purchase of raw materials to process, well that when it gets a bit dog eat dog, so this is where we need to have a very comprehensive competitive strategy.

When exporting processed food products overseas to countries such as Japan, there comes a requirement to meet very high food safety standards and also a number of other ISO standards as well. Has working to these high standards been part of Phuoc Tien’s success trading in the international markets?

Yes, very much so. When I started the company back in 1995, a lot of research went into establishing our production policies and procedures, as well as a few visits to Japan to study their food processing operations to enable us meet the Japanese food import requirement. We received our HACCP (Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point) certification early in our trading, as well as implementing a number of other ISO (International Standards Organisation) standards applying to workers health and safety and general business operations systems, so we feel very proud of our ability to meet even the highest of international standard requirements relating to food processing and food exports.