Calcutta, Feb. 1: Bengal has exported seafood worth Rs 562 crore last fiscal. Even though this represents a 10 per cent growth in exports over the previous year, the state still has a relatively low percentage of value-added products in the export basket and its cultivation farms are in the grip of regional politics.

At the national level, 4.6 lakh tonnes of seafood worth Rs 6,700 crore were exported last fiscal. Of this, the share of value-added, ready-to-eat products would be at a low of 5 to 10 per cent, said Rajarshi Banerjee, secretary of the Seafood Exporters’ Association of India, Bengal region.

In Bengal, total exports, including fish and seafood, is around 15000 mt. Of this, less than 5 per cent would be value-added products.

According to Marine Products Export Development Authority of India (MPEDA), seafood exports will reach $4.5 billion by 2008-09 from $1.5 billion at present. The share of value-added products should go up to 30-40 per cent by then.

Fish exports in the state have gone up substantially from 200 to 300 tonnes about four to five years ago to 2500 to 3000 tonnes, which is mainly due to dramatic improvement in districts like Midnapore.

The state has an untapped area of 1.45 lakh hectares for black tiger prawn cultivation, but regional politics have deterred a number of potential cultivators from setting up breeding farms, according to industry sources.

The MPEDA plans to make India a reprocessing hub for global seafood. However, of the 320 processing units in the country, only 145 have been approved by the European Union.

Seafood exports to the EU stand at 27.42 per cent, USA at 23.41 per cent, Japan at 18.09 per cent and China at 11.42 per cent, MPEDA officials said.

In Bengal, the figures are more dismal as of the 29 processing units, only five have approval for exports to the EU.

A high-level Norwegian delegation is set to visit the city for the 15th India International Seafood Show organised by the MPEDA to discuss the opportunities for reprocessing facilities, value additions, aqua culture, revival of sick units and resource-specific fishing.

Indian exports to Japan used to be around 40 per cent and has gone down to 18 per cent due to problems of suitability of water body in cultivation and antibiotic residue.

In order to initiate discussions with Japanese importers and apprise them of the measures taken to counter such problems, a delegation from MPEDA has proposed a visit to Japan in early March.