Vietnam seafood giant remains stubbornly in the red

Agifish, a major seafood company, reported a second straight year of losses in 2018 as both exports and domestic sales fell.

Agifish reported losses in 2018 as both exports and domestic sales fell. Photo by Reuters/Kham

The recently released 2018 audited financial report of one of Vietnam's 10 largest seafood export companies puts its loss at VND178 billion ($7.66 million).

The An Giang Fisheries Import Export Joint Stock Company, to give its formal name, had lost VND190 billion ($8.2 million) a year earlier.

The company said the loss came as sales downed 43 percent to VND1.29 trillion ($55.27 million) in 2018, due to lower fish exports and domestic sales as well as lower revenues from by-products.

The poor performance last year caused auditors to raise doubts about the company's ability to remain a going concern, but the management rejected this, saying it would increase domestic and export sales, adjust prices and reduce costs to return to the black in 2019.

Agifish has total assets of VND1.23 trillion ($52.92 million) and debts of VND800 billion ($34.42 million).

The Vietnamese seafood industry faced some challenges last year such as being subject to a "yellow card" warning by the European Commission for failing to demonstrate sufficient progress in the fight against illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing. There were also technical barriers and anti-dumping duties in several markets.

Seafood export value rose 5.8 percent year-on-year in 2018 to reach $8.8 billion, according to the Vietnam Customs.