Following this year's Spring Festival Guangdong Prefabricated Cuisine Appreciation and Exchange Conference, which entered Canadian Chinese supermarkets and markets, this month's Guangdong Prefabricated Cuisine Special Promotion Event will also visit Singapore Food Exhibition and Chinese restaurants to meet local consumers, providing a feast for overseas chambers of commerce, food enthusiasts and other relevant organizations and representatives, and building a bridge to jointly discuss opportunities for agricultural trade cooperation between China and Singapore.

Firstly, the topic of pre made dishes became popular online, with Chenghai Lion Head Goose pre made dishes, Xuwen Pineapple pre made dishes, Zhanjiang Aquatic pre made dishes, and other pre made dishes heading out to sea; Later this year, the No. 1 central document put forward the idea of "cultivating and developing the prefabricated vegetable industry". Guangdong prefabricated vegetable appraisal and exchange meetings frequently settled overseas, enjoying the support of the RCEP policy, and Guangdong prefabricated vegetables have been under the spotlight. What are the opportunities and challenges faced by the current export of prefabricated vegetables from Guangdong? How to grasp the key and solve the problem of going to sea?

Standard is king, enhance the competitiveness of overseas markets

To export prepared dishes overseas means a level of production and capacity that is scalable and in line with international standards.

"The prefabricated food industry in China is not very mature, and one aspect of that is the standards." Li Yijing, Vice president of the Guangdong Office of the Singapore Chamber of Commerce in China, said. In her view, the group standards of the prepared dishes industry are uneven, and promoting Guangdong enterprises to join the group standards and improve the internationalization level of the group standards will greatly improve the competitiveness of Guangdong prepared dishes in the overseas market.

In the industry, domestic prefabricated vegetable products must be adjusted and changed in accordance with export standards, including product indicators, product packaging, product transportation, etc., which has become a consensus. The "Import and Export Food Safety Management Measures" officially implemented in 2022 also makes it clear that when enterprises export prepared dishes and other foods, they need to pay attention to food safety and hygiene control, food packaging and transportation methods, customs supervision and inspection, notification and verification, food standards and other related matters.

"Food safety regulatory systems and laws and regulations differ greatly between different countries, which is a major difficulty for the export of prepared vegetable products." The enterprises must have the relevant certificates required by the exporting countries, and the products must meet the relevant indicators and requirements of the exporting countries, so that the prepared dishes can be successfully exported." General Administration of Customs Guangdong branch office responsible person said.

Li Yijing (right), Vice President of the Guangdong Office of the Singapore Chamber of Commerce in China, and Li Huang (left), General manager of Guangzhou Snow Print Food Co., LTD

In addition, in order to earn foreign exchange for exports and produce prepared dishes in accordance with international standards, enterprises need to layout and plan as soon as possible. "Many domestic prefabricated vegetable manufacturers only focus on the domestic market and do not pay attention to the foreign market. When he found that foreign markets were important, it was too late to benchmark overseas export standards." Li Huang, general manager of Guangzhou Snow Printing Food Co., LTD., said that under such circumstances, the factory reconstruction of the enterprise will take time, the system certification will take time, and the export filing will take time, and the next six months have passed, and the entire market competition pattern may have changed.

Technology-based, to solve the sea preservation problem

Preservation technology has always been a barrier for Guangdong prepared vegetables to go to sea.

Huizhou Shunxing Food Co., LTD. (hereinafter referred to as "Huizhou Shunxing") in the preservation of this "kan" for more than 20 years, there are many feelings. "The most challenging part is the preservation process. I vaguely remember that in 1998, we shipped the finished products to Huangpu Terminal in Guangzhou and delivered them to Hong Kong by sea. At that time, general cargo ships did not have refrigeration equipment, and mainly used ice to keep fresh, which was a great risk. To this end, with the help of government departments, the company applied for refrigerated container trucks with Chinese and Hong Kong license plates. Since August 1999, we have been loading goods directly at the factory and shipping them to Hong Kong by land route, which has greatly reduced transportation time." Huizhou Shunxing planning manager Chen Yilin in an interview with the Southern Rural Daily reporter said.

For how to lock the umami, Li Huang also has experience, "Our snow printing fresh food prefabricated dishes temperature is mainly controlled at 0-4℃, can maximize the retention of the delicious and nutrition of prefabricated dishes, but only 3 to 5 days of shelf life." In order to ensure that the whole cold chain and temperature are accurate and controllable, freezing technology and cold chain cost investment are indispensable.

Different from frozen prefabricated dishes, normal temperature prefabricated dishes get rid of the dependence on the cold chain, but have higher requirements in packaging preservation technology and taste.

"When a dish is cooked, it must be sent to the sterilizer for two and a half hours, which makes many of our ribs and fish bones (soft) edible." Han Ziwei, chairman of the White Horse Group, pointed out bluntly, "That is to say, the problem with this technology is that it tastes good." The food safety is fine, and the meat does not tolerate high temperatures."

How to maintain the sterile, low-bacteria environment of normal temperature prepared dishes while ensuring the taste? Wang Fengzhong, director of the Institute of Agricultural Product Processing of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, believes that the normal temperature preprocessed vegetable processing technology has now undergone great changes, and there is no need for high temperature autoclave sterilization at the same time, "such as instantaneous superheated steam sterilization, or instantaneous ultra-high pressure sterilization, and ionizing radiation sterilization, as well as working hard in sealed packaging materials." Can improve the taste of normal temperature prepared dishes to some extent."

Platform link to improve the docking efficiency of overseas markets

"It is impossible for Guangdong prefabricated vegetable companies to go to sea alone." Li Yijing said that Guangdong prefabricated vegetable enterprises can go to sea in the form of "platform chain platform" to improve the docking efficiency of overseas markets.

What is a "platform chain platform"? That is, instead of the previous "point-to-point" form of a single enterprise to a single customer, it has become a "face-to-face" form of interconnection between association organizations and association organizations, which matches market resources to the greatest extent and forms complementary advantages.

"We hope to rely on the Guangdong prepared Dishes Industry Alliance and the chamber of commerce and associations in the intended market to connect, complement each other and exchange information." Liang Haorong, vice president of Pinzhen Holding Group, said that some overseas markets are far away, coupled with unfamiliar with local laws and policies, and the cost of on-site matchmaking with a single customer enterprise is high. The form of docking between the association and the association is undoubtedly the best choice. The use of the other association's understanding of local laws and policies can reduce the risks caused by poor information in overseas markets such as laws, imports and exports to a certain extent.

Using the platform as a link may enhance the local market's recognition of Guangdong agricultural products. By the end of 2022, Shenzhen's "medical device Exhibition group" and "intelligent Manufacturing Exhibition group" held together to grab a single sea, for example, the amount of intended orders returned by light exceeded 600 million yuan. CAI Qiaowu, head of Shenzhen Medical Device Industry Association, said that organizing a group to go to sea is more in line with the mode of small and medium-sized enterprises to go to sea to "grab orders". Through the "Shenzhen Exhibition Group" business card created by Shenzhen for a long time, "Shenzhen Wisdom" has a stronger recognition of overseas local dealers and buyers, and it is easier to obtain recognition.

In addition, the platform can also link expert resources to conduct "literacy" training for enterprises in the import and export of prepared vegetables. Eu trade research scholar Liang Xinchang said that many enterprises can not distinguish between the requirements of China's export of food and the requirements of export destination countries to import food. Liang Xinchang suggested that the Guangdong Province prepared vegetables industry Alliance organize experts to "literacy" for enterprises that are willing to export, guide enterprises to find positioning, direction and open up channels according to their own conditions, cultivate leading enterprises in the export of prepared vegetables, and let China's prepared vegetables fragrance floating around the world.

[Reporter] Lam Kin-man

[Source] Southern Rural Daily