Fast facts
Exports
- Seafood export value increased by 10% in 2017–18 to $1.58 billion
- Export volumes fell by 1% to 50,741 tonnes
Imports
- Seafood import value was up 3.8% to $2.15 billion
- Seafood import volume was down 2% at 221,500 tonnes


Where does most of the seafood come from?
With global wild catch stable at 90 million tonnes per annum for many years now, any growth in seafood production has to come from aquaculture. We are at the point where 50% of global production is now coming from aquaculture farmed sources.
So the key supply markets are aquaculture producers in what used to be called developing countries. But now know as tier 2 or 3 countries. The top aquaculture suppliers to Australia are Thailand, Viet Nam, China, Malaysia and Norway. Wild catch mostly comes from New Zealand and canned tuna from the Pacific that is processed mostly in Thailand.

Graphic Credit : FAO 2020 SOFIA report

Australia’s apparent consumption of seafood increased, on average, at an annual rate of 1.9% between 1998–99 and 2017–18, from an estimated 238,968 tonnes in 1998–99 to 341,272 tonnes in 2017–18.
Per person apparent consumption of seafood decreased slightly between 2007–08 and 2017–18 (trending down from 14.7 kilograms per person in 2007–08 to 13.7 kilograms per person in 2017–18).
Domestic Seafood Consumption - Top 12 seafood categories and the contribution from imports
Category (Top 12) | Tonnes domestic consumption (tonnes) | Imports (tonnes) | Imports contribution (%) |
whitefish | 91,378 | 52,822 | 58 |
canned fish (tuna) | 82,686 | 82,686 | 100 |
salmon | 51,276 | 4,805 | 9 |
prawns | 50,326 | 31,734 | 63 |
misc | 32,403 | 24,593 | 76 |
squid | 20,086 | 17,061 | 85 |
scallop | 8,445 | 2,715 | 32 |
oily fish | 7,723 | - | - |
tuna | 6,950 | 1,049 | 15 |
mussels | 6,049 | 2,238 | 37 |
crab | 5,858 | 1,700 | 29 |
lobsters | 3,187 | 1,178 | 37 |
total | 366,366 | 222,581 | 53 |
Trade Data
Trade data from ABARES (Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences) , is available courtesy of the FRDC (Fisheries Research and Development Corporation) website.
https://www.frdc.com.au/services/seafood-trade-data
Seafood Imports (by main categories) over the last 5 years


a All frozen fish not inc Hakes, Salmonids, Tunas and Icefishes.