ASIA, particularly China, offers Australian food producers enormous opportunities, but a lot of work needs to be done to maintain and grow our position in the market, long-time Australia China Business Council member Barry White (pictured) said.
"It's important we realise more than 125 countries have China as their number one trading partner," said Mr White, who has more than 35 years developing business access and performance in China.
"So we need not only to be good, we need to be better."
To drive growth, Australia should target the high-value market, which will involve maintaining the high quality and safe food for which the country is known, he said at the Victorian Agribusiness Summit last Friday.
Building relationships and doing regional marketing are also vital to accessing the growing the sector, Mr White said.
The Australia China Business Council is working with the State Government's Regional Development Victoria on the Growing business opportunities with China project to engage regional communities more directly in building business relationships with China.
"Regional marketing is becoming more relevant, as it is a great way to build product loyalty," he said.
For example, Chinese groups are visiting Victorian regions to see first-hand the quality and production of the food grown there.
Mr White suggests a region's businesses including tourism and education providers as well as agribusinesses work together to provide a "whole of region" experience to build the region as a brand.
The project that started in May, is focused on five regions across the State: Barwon South-West, Hume, Loddon-Mallee, Gippsland and the Grampians.
"We analysed the export profile of each region through industry consultation, then present forums on issues that came out of that consultation and most importantly we set out to establish networks because we've got to have longer term processes."
Forums in Geelong, Warrnambool and Hamilton are scheduled for October and the program is to be rolled out in the next few months, he said.
Another government policy area that could affect Australia's ability to tap into the growing Asian market is trade agreements.
"The concern many of us have is we will see compromises taken (in Australia-China Free Trade negotiations) which will leave agriculture in a less strong position.
"We need to make sure agriculture is not disadvantaged in the rush to sign a free-trade agreement with (Chinese) President Xi Jinping coming out here later this year."
