Disastrous investments continue to hold back China’s flagship distant water fishing firm China National Fisheries Co. (CNFC), according to company accounts for the first half of the year.
CNFC Overseas Fishery Co Ltd. – the name for the listed arm of CNFC – is flagging a loss of between CNY 42 million (USD 6.1 million, EUR 5.4 million) and CNY 48 million (USD 6.9 million, EUR 6.1 million) for the first half of 2019. This contrasts with CNY 2.6 million (USD 378,137, EUR 335,599) in losses for the same period in 2018.
The firm is blaming the losses on a troubled subsidiary firm Xiamen Xin Yang Zhou Aquatic Products Processing Co., while it continues to lose money in a joint venture – Hua Nong Property Insurance Co. The completed accounts have yet to be published, so it's not possible to break down the losses.
CNFC has been seeking to diversify as China’s government promises to further reduce fuel subsidies to distant water fishery firms under pressure from the WTO, which is currently negotiating a deal to ending such subsidies. CNFC saw revenues from fisheries drop 16 percent year-on-year in 2018 to USD 94 million (EUR 83.4 million).
Operating nearly 300 vessels and transportation facilities in the Atlantic Ocean, Indian Ocean, as well as the Pacific and Antarctic oceans, China National Fisheries Co. is one of China’s key state owned fishery companies. Formerly known as the China Fisheries Joint Company, the firm in the mid-1980's started to sail into Africa waters. Today, it has boats and docking facilities in almost a dozen nations, including Morocco, Senegal, Nigeria, and Gabon. It also has subsidiaries in Spain and the United States. The company is ultimately controlled by the China Agricultural Development Co, the giant conglomerate managing key government agricultural and fisheries companies.
