Pangasius fillets have a stable market in 70 countries in the world nowadays. They are coming from fish that is grown in farms in the Mekong Delta in a very natural environment. The Pangasius is a native Vietnamese who was traveling the large River Mekong and its Delta since the beginning of times. But its career as a farm fish started around 10 years ago when the fish was tamed to be harvested from the Rivers and Ponds. Since then the white and versatile meat of the Pangasius became a source comparable Salmon, Tilapia or even Alaska Pollack – it can be used in every dish, for every meal, it is at home in white table restaurants as well as snack outlets. So here is some information about this wonder fish out of the Mekong.
The Market Name: Pangasius
The Scientific Name: Pangasius hypophthalmus (Vietnamese: “Tra”)
(Before this fish was also called Pangasius “micronemus”)
Pangasius bocourti (Vietnamese: “Basa”)
The Family: Catfish.
Pangasius is belonging to the worldwide Catfish family
The Home: The Mekong River in Vietnam
Pangasius is still traveling the Mekong River, spawning in the upper parts of the River in Cambodia and going down to breed in the Mekong Delta of Vietnam.
The Farms: River Farms and Ponds
Pangasius Hypophthalmus is the most farmed species nowadays in Vietnam. This fish grows from juveniles to harvest size (1.0 – 1.5 Kilos) in 6~7 months. This fish needs less oxygen in the water than the Pangasius bocourti. The bocourti supplies under 2% of the total farming harvest of about 500.000 tons per year.
The farms are situated in the two big Rivers of the Mekong in the River Tien and the River Hau. About 60—70% of the fish are bred in the Hau near the Cambodian border in An Giang Province.
There are three farming methods: The River farms, Houses situated on the shores where the fish are living in the stream, Ponds, that are still or with current and Quangs, parts of the River, that had been fenced and the fish live in the natural River environment.
The Feed:
Rice bran, soy bean meal and little fish meal....
The feed of Pangasius is very natural. It contains rice bran, some soy meal and small fish catches. It is over 90% vegetarian and sometimes created by the farmers themselves (wet feed). There is also industrialized pellet floating feed containing the same ingredients from natural sources that is used in the farms nowadays.
There is next to no medication given in the feed – there are only one or two diseases known to the Pangasius that is a very durable fish. The feeding takes place by hand (when it is pellet fed) or in the Quangs by feeding canons or sometimes by feed grinders who grind the wet feed into the ponds.
Through the natural ingredients there is not hazard through feed residues in the environment of the ponds or in the rivers as the leftovers are bacteriological destroyed or taken away by the current
The Difference:
Basa or Tra? Hypophthalmus or bocourti?
The Pangasius bocourti had been the first fish to be marketed. This fish has a higher fat content than the Pangasius hypophthalmus but grows in 12 months instead of 6 months. It has mostly white meat.
This fish needs a lot of oxygen in the water and is scarce today – only about 2% of the fish harvested is still bocourti. It can be detected when round on the big fat chin sack, a bigger and shorter head and a bigger belly than the hypophthalmus.
Also the bocourti has the typical Catfish “moustache” the hypophthalmus is missing.
The Pangasius hypophthalmus is the usual Pangasius sold today. It needs only 6 month of growth and can stand lower oxygen situations in the water. It comes in three main different colors.
The Harvesting Season:
Two times in a year and always
The Pangasius is harvested two main times in the year but still can be offered all year round. The harvesting is taking place in netting the fish from the farm and transports it with well boats alive to the factories.
The main harvesting seasons is starting in spring, March, at the beginning of the raining season and lasts until September, the end of the raining season in the Mekong Delta.
The reason for the main harvesting during these periods is the fact that the change in water temperature affects the fish and the farmers want to sell their fish off avoiding losses.
Between October and February also fish is available but less than during the main season.
The Processing:
Frozen Fillets from the live fish
There are very modern processing plants nowadays in Vietnam for Pangasius. In An Giang, the most important production region, there are 27 factories working some of them quite big with even more than 5.000 people employed. The fish that reaches the factory alive will be slaughtered by cutting the gills and then bled in ice water. Then the fish is filleted by hand. Afterwards the skin is removed by means of a skinning machine. In a further processing area the fillets are trimmed classified by size and color and then in different ways frozen (either plate frozen or IQF). The factories have mostly modern equipment but are still very labor intensive as 80% of the process is done by hand. After processing the fish is packed and sold in container loads to the markets.
The Colors:
White, red and yellow
Pangasius hypophthalmus comes in different colors.
These colors are:
White (highest demand in USA)
Light Pink (high demand in Europe)
Pink (good demand)
Light “Cream” yellow (demand in Eastern Europe)
Yellow “Cream” (high demand in Asia)
The Sizes:
Three main grades
Pangasius fillets come in different sizes.
These main sizes are:
120 - 170 grams
170 - 220 grams
220 grams up
The Trimming:
Belly off, belly on
There are different trimming grades in Pangasius Fillets. The fish has a belly flap that can be removed fully or half. The most used trimming grade is belly off but there are also trimmings with the belly and with half the belly. The belly is a very weak piece of meat that is often folded under the fillet before freezing and the fillet is wrapped into a foil (so called: candy wrap!). All blood stains from wrong slaughtering or bruises are cut out of the fillet so that an optimal even shaped fish fillet can be offered. This gets the highest price.
The Chemicals:
STTP yes or no?
The most used Chemical on the Pangasius is STTP (Tripoly Phosphates) and Non-Phosphates also used in combination with salt. These Chemicals are soaked in the meat by tumbling the fillet and care for the natural moisture stay in the fillet or even soak more water into the fish and enlarge the weight by this practice. STTP is accepted in most markets but underlies certain regulations of use in the EU area (i.e. Brifisol and NP 30 is not accepted in the EU).
STTP also use must be declared while the use of Non-Phosphates (products with the same effect that cannot be detected like STTP) can be declaration free. The use of Phosphates makes a shiny fillet that can be reaching soft and smeary surface and tissue of the fillet when overused.
The Freezing:
Glazing and IQF
The main freezing methods for Pangasius fillets are plate freezing and IQF. The plate freezing method shows the fillet put on an aluminum tray and glazed with water to be put into a horizontal plate freezer and brought down to 25-40 degrees minus. When IQF freezing the single fillet is glazed and out on a belt freezer that transports it trough a freezing tunnel or a modern spiral belt freezer. Afterwards the fillet is taken from the belt and packed. When plate freezing is used in the factories, often the fillets have to be broken apart. So the IQF method results in a higher quality. Sometimes the factories wrongly declare their plate freezing as IQF. So it is important to define in the specification if it is real IQF freezing or plate freezing.
The main glazing amounts used in Pangasius are:
5% ( recommended protective glazing)
10% (generally used in Europe)
15% (sometimes used in Europe and USA)
20% (used in Eastern and special markets in Europe)
The Price:
What are the specifications?
The price negotiations for Pangasius fillets are very specific and the pricing is strongly depending on the breeding method, the color, the trimming and the glazing used.
So here are some quality criteria and how they affect the price of the product:
Farming methods:
Fish from River farms and Quangs normally gain a higher price than the products from the ponds. Some times ago the pond products were not of high quality for there was a high danger of off flavor and yellow color. But nowadays through floating feed that is digested from the surface of the water and aeration systems that bring oxygen into the ponds, the pond fish very much developed for the better and there is some good quality fish coming from ponds.
Colors:
In the beginning the white meat products, namely coming for the real “Basa”, the Pangasius bocourti, was gaining the highest price in the markets. But in Europe the light pink and pink products were also very much accepted so nowadays sometimes the light pink and pink products gain the same price level as the white.
The light yellow fish became a good seller in Eastern markets of Europe like Poland and Russia but is lower in price like the white and pink version.
The lowest price is gained for the yellow (“Cream” colored fillet that has its main markets in Asia (like in Singapore).
Trimmings and Glazing:
The best price is gained for a fully trimmed product that represents some 30 – 35% of the yield of the round fish. Belly leftovers, skin on gain lower price.
The low glazing like 5% or 10% are surely higher in price like the 15% and 20%.
Also IQF frozen fish is higher in price than plate frozen or double frozen repacked from a frozen block.
Chemicals:
The use if STTP in combination with high glazing can cut the price of the original fillet significantly.
Basically it is much recommended to define exactly what is requested when it comes to the different criteria.
A low priced Pangasius is not saying anything about its quality for the customer.
The Products:
Round, Fillets and Added value
Most of the product sold from Pangasius is the fillet, skin off, fully trimmed. This fillet comes in different colors and different freezing methods (see above)
Sometimes also Pangasius is sold whole gutted (mostly for the purpose of hot smoking in the German market). This fish will be then frozen then in a tunnel freezer.
Also steaks of Pangasius are available, single packed or shatter packed.
Some companies in Vietnam specialized in a whole range of Pangasius added value products like skewers, filled rolls, even tofu made from the Vietnamese Catfish.
One company offers over 100 different Pangasius added value products. But this is quite a new field. The next step for the added value Pangasius seems to be a breaded fillet that is already in the delivery program of most of the fillet processors.
The Packaging:
Bags and boxes
Pangasius is usually shipped to the markets in
20’or 40’ reefer containers.
These containers can be packed with different kind of packets mostly designed after the customer’s requests.
Here are the most common ways of offering packed Pangasius:
Bulk Cartons
5kg, 10 kg in shatter pack or interleaved
Foil Bags (Pet bags)
0.2 kg, 0.5 kg, 1 kg, 5 kg, 10 kg per unit
Retail packs
Single packed fillets at 2x 125 grams and carton packed.
