Philippines, China thaw relations on seafood trade

China will open its market to seafood from the Philippines, following a controversial about-face by the country’s president, Rodrigo Duterte, in a visit to Beijing this week.

Vowing to abandon his nation’s long-held alliance with the U.S. to embrace China, Duterte’s pivot to China has shocked many, given Manila has fought an acrimonious campaign against Chinese development of parts of the South China Sea also claimed by the Philippines. China banned Filipino agricultural and aquatic products in 2014 in as a result of the territorial spat, which saw massive protests outside the Chinese embassy in Manila.

China now promises to “boost” Filipino imports, according to a report in the People’s Daily (the Chinese Communist Party organ). But the article doesn’t specify any extra incentives other than lifting the import ban. Sea cucumbers and grouper from the Philippines have traditionally been shipped into southern China and Hong Kong, and Filipino tuna processors had also sought markets in mainland China prior to Beijing’s ban on imports, a ban known in some quarters of the Chinese press as the “banana ban,” due to hitherto growing Chinese demand for Filipino fruit.

China is the third-biggest buyer of Filipino exports, after Japan and the U.S. It remains to be seen if president Duterte can secure a return of Filipino fishermen to areas of the South China Sea from which they’ve been ejected by Chinese authorities.