INTERNATIONAL COMPETITIVENESS OF CATFISH IN THE U.S. MARKET: A CONSTANT MARKET SHARE ANALYSIS.

Using ‘Constant Market Share’ analysis, we have decomposed the growth of catfish exports of major catfish exporting countries to the United States (U.S.) into structural, competitive and second-order effects and their sub-components. We have also studied competitiveness of the U.S. farm-raised catfish in the domestic market. The U.S. farm-raised catfish industry could not harvest the benefits of the supply-demand gap created in the U.S. due the shift of Vietnam's catfish exports away from the U.S. after 2003; however, China and Thailand and also some other catfish exporting countries derived the greatest extent of the benefits. Decline in the competitiveness of Vietnam's catfish exports to the United States has made China and Thailand catfish more competitive in the U.S. market. The benefits of increased demand for total fisheries products at the world level to the U.S. catfish industry have been marginalized by decline in competitiveness of the U.S. farm-raised catfish in domestic market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]