Narinjara News


Burmese prawn may harm Bangladesh’s prawn export

Dhaka, January 5: Burmese prawn importing into Bangladesh may harm the Bangladesh’s prawn export industry, according to the Bangladesh’s largest Bengali newspaper, Daily Jugantor.

Due to the American sanction on Burma, Singaporean and Malaysian businesses stopped buying prawn from Burma. Since then, prawn has been smuggled into Bangladesh through the border trades.  However, Burmese prawn is packed with chemical perseveres rather than using enough ice, and this is effecting the quality of the prawn.

There are 17 prawn importing companies operating from the border town called Teknaf and the port city of Chittagong in Bangladesh. Since there is no buyer for prawn in Burma, the prawn price is diving deep and prawn industry is in deep trouble. Hence, prawn trading has turned westward: exporting to Bangladesh, which again exports to the Western countries.

Bangladesh exports prawn to USA, Canada, Europe, and Japan. The prawn export said to valued 1.5 billion US dollars a year, the newspaper quoting a conference of Bangladesh Frozen Food Exporters Association (BFFEA).

An English language newspaper, The Independence, reported that Bangladesh has earned about 80 million US dollars by exporting shrimps to the US during the last financial year. #