Since last week, processors have been waiting to find out whether secondary processing of Alaska fish will be subject to a new 25 percent tariff, which China announced Friday in retaliation to American tariffs on Chinese goods.
The Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute says, as far as they can tell, the answer is no.
“Our information from our office in China and from our trade partners in China is that this new 25 percent tariff will not be applied to seafood that is processed in China for re-export,” Alexa Tonkovich, Executive Director of ASMI, said.
Tonkovich adds that the logistics of how these tariffs will be applied are still being worked out, and ASMI is monitoring the situation as it evolves.
Alaska seafood processors often head and gut fish then send it to China for secondary processing and it is exported to other countries from there.
Kodiak processors have told KMXT that they have product in China, on the way to China, and product loaded into frozen containers that they have been holding in Kodiak that they want to send to China for reprocessing.
A delegation from China is scheduled to visit Alaska in July.
ASMI will host the group, which plans to tour fish processing plants in Kodiak and Larsen Bay. The visit comes on the heels of Governor Bill Walker’s trade mission to China.
China is the largest export market for Alaska seafood and a major reprocessing location.