Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs and aT Achieve 194 Online Export Consultations and $6 Million in Sales

[Asia Economy Sejong=Reporter Kim Hyewon] The Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs and the Korea Agro-Fisheries & Food Trade Corporation announced on the 13th that they held an ‘Online Export Consultation for HMR and Meal Kit Products’ on the 7th and 8th, achieving a total of 194 consultations worth 6 million USD.

The consultation event was attended remotely by 66 domestic export companies and 60 major buyers from 12 countries, including China, the United States, France, and Thailand, who have online and offline distribution channels. The corporation focused on the rapidly growing home meal replacement (HMR) market after the global pandemic and themed the event around ‘HMR and Meal Kit Products.’ A corporation official stated, "Overseas buyers showed great interest in various meal kit products such as spicy Tteokbokki and Kimchi Jjigae, which have captured the tastes of the MZ generation (Millennials + Generation Z), as well as sauces and seasoning products necessary for direct cooking."

In particular, this consultation resulted in 1 million USD worth of consultations through pre-matching with local Chinese buyers for domestic exporters who were scheduled to participate in the Shanghai International Food Expo, which was inevitably postponed due to the resurgence of COVID-19.

Chinese buyer Company S, who participated in the consultation, said, "Since COVID-19, local demand for HMR and meal kit products that allow easy enjoyment of K-food at home has increased, so we joined the consultation to import related items. Through the online consultation, we were able to meet various exporters in one place, and we plan to add more products to the O2O mall we currently operate."

Gino Seon, Director of Export Food at the corporation, said, "We will continue to support various online export consultations tailored to the needs of exporters and overseas buyers for HMR and meal kit products, and in the second half of the year, we will actively support our exporters’ overseas market development by considering the resumption of offline consultation events."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.