South Korea's largest food company, Dongyuan Group, has announced that it will cooperate with Beijing's well-known canning company, Beijing Origin, to formally enter the Chinese food market, focusing on the development of tuna and other marine food production and marketing.

Not long ago, Dongyuan set up a factory in Qingdao and planned to invest $2.5 million to establish a company in China that specializes in canned tuna with a daily output of about 30 tons.

Dongyuan Group has 17 subsidiaries, with sales totaling $500 million last year and exports amounting to $50 million. It has become the leading enterprise in the Korean food industry, especially accounting for 75% of the market share of tuna, the representative food of South Korea.

The large-scale entry into the Chinese market, Dongyuan Group President Park Renqiu said that he is optimistic about the potential of the Chinese market, "tuna canned, for example, the current annual sales of the Chinese tuna market 20 million cans, only one-tenth of the Korean market." Moreover, this industry with a production value of 15 billion yuan, has its own brand and can export their own brand or form a certain degree of fame in the domestic market enterprises are few.

A person in charge of Dongyuan said that Dongyuan has achieved the first market share and become the first brand in tuna canned products in China in three to five years of reserve.

Recently, foreign capital has entered a significant growth momentum in China's canned industry. Information from the China Canning Industry Association indicates that many foreign enterprises have begun to conduct preliminary investigations into the canning industry in China.

According to Liang Zhongkang, director of China canned industry association, in 2003, the country exported 1 million 600 thousand tons of canned food. Some analysts say that the Chinese market as a springboard for exports is also the reason why foreign investors favour canning industry.