They say good things come in small packages, and that is certainly the case with caviar exports from the Chinese Mainland. A tin of caviar may be small, but it’s also an expensive and perishable product, which makes it a good thing that cannot wait.

The Cathay Cargo team in Chengdu has adapted the Cathay Fresh solution to enable the swift, temperature-controlled export of consignments of this black gold to high-end restaurants and shops across the globe. 

The world’s largest caviar exporter

The Chinese Mainland was the biggest exporter of caviar in 2023, exporting some 276 tonnes. While that’s imperceptible in global cargo terms, it’s a vast quantity of a delicacy bought and served by the gram, and far outpaces the traditional export markets of Russia and Iran. 

In part, this growth is the result of years of research into making caviar into a more sustainable product. Historically, caviar has been produced by harvesting eggs from fish that take years to grow and are killed in the extraction process. 

Now, strides in breeding have led to faster maturing fish, while new techniques mean fish can be returned to the water after their roe has been removed, as is the case with some exports. So rather than scarcity alone, this caviar’s cost is also derived from hard years spent in R&D and in creating an environment to produce caviar more sustainably. 

One of the areas with the right environment is in Ya’an in the west of Sichuan Province. Here, the clear mountain water offers an ideal aquaculture environment, and the region exports around 100 tonnes of caviar a year to destinations from Hong Kong to New York, Paris and Toronto.

“The value of caviar hinges on its fleeting freshness,” says Area Cargo Manager Angela Shan. “From production and transportation to its arrival on Michelin-starred plates, even minor temperature deviations can compromise the delicate flavour.”

The freshness corridor

To meet the annual export demand of caviar from Ya’an via Chengdu, Cathay Cargo’s Chengdu team worked with shippers, including Frosista, to create a tailored “freshness corridor” – an unbroken cold chain that keeps shipments between 2-8°C throughout the journey. 

The caviar, whether packed in large catering containers or small individual tins, which are then placed with ice packs in Styrofoam boxes and loaded into chiller trucks within 15 minutes of processing for the journey to Chengdu Shuangliu International and Chengdu Tianfu International Airports according to flight schedules. Depending on the order size, each box is usually around 15kg. 

At the airport, Cathay Cargo has worked with shippers, forwarders and airport authorities to create a “green lane” for acceptance to minimise handling time between arrival and safe storage in the cold room. The ground handling agent (GHA) liaises with Customs to arrange a time and parking bay for the truck. 

“The GHA secures a specific area with an x-ray scanning channel 15 minutes before the cold truck with the caviar arrives,” says Shan. “We ensure that the dolly is ready on the other side before the truck arrives so that we move the caviar to the cold room as soon as acceptance is completed.”

The Cathay Cargo team has been able to use Cathay Pacific’s extensive global flight network and frequency of flights to procure and develop the caviar business. “It means we can offer near-immediate flight transfers on arrival to European hubs like Paris and Milan or North American cities,” says Shan. “This optimised network approach has led clients to choose Cathay Cargo’s Hong Kong hub to expedite deliveries.”

As Ya’an caviar becomes more of a presence on luxury dining menus worldwide, Cathay Cargo is enabling its growth with temperature-controlled technology and worldwide connectivity.