Why is the price of sea crabs so different between the south and the north?

Supply shortage: sea crab prices in the south and north are poles apart

According to a report by China Rural Voice's "Sannong China," as the weather turns colder day by day, seafood markets across the country have recently entered a season of supply shortage. Following the pattern of previous years, during this period sea crab prices should see a substantial rise. In the southern aquatic product markets, local sea crab prices have been running at a high level, supply is in demand, and the scene is bustling.

But the northern sea crab market has shown a completely opposite situation. Compared with the southern market, northern sea crab prices have fallen instead of risen. Some people find it strange: given the same winter supply shortage, why is the difference between south and north so large?

Entering December, temperatures in China's Yellow Sea, Bohai Sea and East China Sea areas have been getting lower and lower, and the number of fishing boats going out to sea has dropped considerably compared with earlier. This has caused onshore seafood supply to begin tightening. At the Shandong Weihai Aquatic Product Wholesale Market, the prices of some seafood products have already risen noticeably, with sea crab prices up by nearly 1/4. Vendor Auntie Ruan:

Auntie Ruan: Crab is in high demand now, the price can't possibly drop. A 4-liang female with roe is 80, without roe 60, about 15 to 20 yuan higher than last month.

Auntie Ruan said that because of the cold weather, the sea crabs sold on the market recently are no longer farmed ones; basically all are caught from the sea. Catching depends on the weather, so whenever it is windy or rainy it affects the volume of sea crabs coming to market, which drives prices up.

Auntie Ruan: In the current weather conditions, there are no farmed ones, so you can only go out to sea to catch crabs. Once the wind comes, the boat has to return to port, and after returning it can't go out the next day. If the boat rests for two days, supply drops, and the price shoots up right away.

Southern crabs are selling briskly, while in the northern aquatic product market the picture is entirely different. Liu Bin, an aquatic product supplier in Dalian, Liaoning Province, is worrying about this year's swimming crab prices.

Liu Bin: In past years, if it was winter, prices were in an upward phase. This year it's not so good. For those of us selling sea-caught crabs, this year is indeed a bit abnormal.

Sun Yuqi, who does a seafood business in Dandong, Jilin, shares the same confusion as Liu Bin. He said the current price of northern sea crabs is not just a little different from last year.

Sun Yuqi: Since last year it has been declining bit by bit, and this year the drop is even bigger than last year. The price is now around 80-something, for female crabs of 4 liang and up. Last year it reached around 122.

Sun Yuqi told reporters that compared with this time period in previous years, the number of local swimming crabs in the north has not increased. In the past two years, fishery resources in the Yellow Sea and Bohai Sea areas have become increasingly scarce, and northern crab supply has become even tighter. But northern crab prices have continued to fall.

Sun Yuqi: Our supply and price no longer really have a relationship. The size of supply and the price have no connection. No matter how much comes in, it's that same price.

Logically, when supply is less than demand, prices should rise. So why say supply and price have no relationship? What is causing the northern sea crab market to show this phenomenon Sun Yuqi describes, which goes against economic laws? One sentence from Auntie Ruan at the Shandong Weihai Aquatic Product Wholesale Market explains the reason.

Auntie Ruan: People come from the north to buy up female crabs with roe, and once they've bought them they ship them back there. Our side is definitely cheaper than the north, customers prefer our local crabs, and the crabs we produce taste better than theirs too.

It turns out that in order to meet the needs of northern customers, some suppliers began wholesaling large quantities of southern sea crabs from the south, then shipping them north to sell. Southern sea crabs taste similar to northern ones, but the price is much cheaper, and they were quickly favored by the market. Northern seller Sun Yuqi:

Sun Yuqi: Southern female crabs are around 60 to 70. This year the volume of crabs coming out of the south is large, so prices there can go a bit higher, while here in Donggang, Dandong, the crab volume is smaller, less comes in, and then there are too many southern crabs, which have pushed out the northeast crabs! So the price came down.

Not only that, because southern crab production is guaranteed and high, and the quality is good while the price is low, even foreign markets have begun to favor southern sea crabs. Sun Yuqi said that in past years, most of China's crab exports to South Korea came from the north. But this year southern crabs have become the substitute and begun to be exported overseas, dealing a big blow to the northern crab market.

Sun Yuqi: In past years northern crabs were sent to South Korea and elsewhere. This year the south has produced crabs, and because southern crabs are cheap and there is a price gap, the crabs South Korea imports now all come from the south. Northern crabs have dropped especially sharply.

This year, the crab markets in the south and north can be described as some rejoicing and some worrying. However, no region has seen unsold stock piling up. Xu Chunhui, an analyst at the Shandong Weihai Aquatic Product Wholesale Market, predicts that later on, crab prices in both the south and the north will see a wave of increases.

Xu Chunhui: Judging from the market patterns of previous years, the possibility of a sharp drop in swimming crab prices in December is not very great. Apart from the influence of weather factors, another main reason is that as New Year's Day approaches, swimming crab trading in the market will gradually become more active, and later market prices are expected to show a fluctuating upward trend.