According to an executive from a processing company in China, the high prices have significantly decreased the demand for chum salmon in western markets.
“Many of our customers are buying pink, instead of chum,” said Frank Zhou, of Ocean One Enterprises, which operates four plants in the Dalian and Yantai regions and buys around 7,000 metric tons of salmon annually.
“Prices of good meat color (GMC) chum from Alaska are over $5,000 (€3,661) per metric ton, which is even more expensive than that of Atlantic salmon,” he told IntraFish.
