Technology developed by a U.S.-based company was used to expedite the first ever shipment of fresh salmon from Chile to the Port of Tianjin, China.

The trial shipment was facilitated by an oxygen management system produced by San Francisco-headquartered BluWrap that extends the shelf life of fresh protein-based food products “while considerably reducing carbon emissions and the use of polystyrene.”

The new technology, the company said, “provides a ground-breaking approach to shipping seafood that can significantly transform China’s dependence on air-freighted fresh and frozen seafood because it ensures food security from remote food sources.”

Tianjin “is living up to the Chinese expression ‘Who will be the first to eat crab?’ – a saying that questions who has the mettle to try something new,” said BluWrap CEO Mark Barnekow.

“With the successful completion of this pilot, we can move forward with our plans to send regular shipments of seafood from Chile to China and expand the availability and variety of fresh proteins to customers in the northern region of the country,” he said.

Chilean fish farmer Salmones Aysen supplied the salmon for the shipment, which was consigned to seafood importer Tiajin PuWan International.

“Air freight is very expensive and fraught with logistical challenges when shipping from Chile to China,” said Pablo Cajtak, CEO of Salmones Aysen in Santiago, Chile.

“China is a rapidly growing and important market for Salmones Aysen and all Chilean salmon producers. BluWrap is a very good logistics solution that makes sense if we want to reach consumers there,” he said.