A seafood supplier sends a health certificate with a letterhead you do not recognise, because the agency that used to issue it does not exist under that name any more. Vietnam’s food-safety authorities have been renamed and merged twice in three years, and a buyer working from an older sourcing guide is checking the wrong name against the wrong register.
💬 Buying seafood out of Vietnam and need the export paperwork checked against the current authority? Tell us the product and destination and we will confirm it with you.
Which authority actually issues the health certificate now?
Vietnam’s National Agro-Forestry-Fisheries Quality, Processing and Market Development Authority (NAFIQPM) issues seafood export health certificates, operating under the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment, which was itself formed in March 2025 by merging the former Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development with the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment.
NAFIQPM is the current name of the body a buyer may still see referred to by older names in supplier documents or in sourcing guides written before the reorganisation — earlier incarnations were known as NAFIQAD, and before that under other departmental names, as the quality-assurance function was folded into and back out of a processing and market-development department over successive restructurings. Where a certificate or a supplier’s compliance file cites an older agency name, that does not make the document invalid on its own, but it is a reason to confirm which body issued it and when, because a certificate from a body that no longer exists in that form is a certificate you cannot verify through the current channel.
Regional testing and certification centres carry out the sampling, assessment and testing that sits behind the certificate; the export health certificate itself is the document confirming that a specific consignment, from a specific listed establishment, meets the destination market’s food-safety requirements.
What does “establishment listing” mean, and why does it matter before you order?
A Vietnamese seafood processing plant has to be listed by name with the relevant NAFIQPM programme before its output can be certified for export to a given market, and the buyer’s own check is confirming that listing, not just asking the supplier for a certificate.
Export to the EU, and export under similar certification programmes to other markets, runs through an establishment list that NAFIQPM maintains and updates. A processing plant not on the current list for your destination market cannot have its output certified for that market, whatever assurances the sales contact gives you. Because the list is updated periodically, ask for the establishment’s current listing status and its establishment code rather than relying on a listing you were shown at the start of the relationship — a plant can be added, suspended or removed from a list over time.
💬 Checking a factory’s registration and certification status against the primary record, rather than the paperwork it emails you, is the same discipline covered in how to verify a Vietnamese supplier remotely. Send us the establishment code and we will check it.
What is IUU catch documentation, and does a buyer need to ask for it separately from the health certificate?
Yes — the health certificate addresses food safety, while catch documentation addresses where and how the fish was caught, and Vietnam is under sustained pressure to prove the second of those two things works.
Vietnam has carried an EU “yellow card” warning over illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing since 2017, and the government has set out to have it lifted, with vessel tracking, an electronic catch documentation and traceability system, and a national fisheries vessel database as the main pillars of that effort. For a buyer, the practical documents to ask for on a wild-caught consignment are the catch certificate confirming the fish was landed by a registered, tracked vessel and the traceability record linking the processed product back to that catch. These sit alongside, not inside, the health certificate — a valid health certificate says the product is safe to eat; it does not on its own confirm the catch was legally taken. For farmed (aquaculture) product, catch documentation of this kind does not apply in the same way, and the relevant traceability question shifts to the farm and hatchery records instead.
Given how actively this system is still being built out, ask a wild-caught supplier for the vessel registration and catch documentation as a matter of course, rather than assuming a health certificate covers it.
💬 Sunsho Trade coordinates seafood sourcing and export documentation checks out of Vietnam for buyers who cannot visit the plant themselves. See our sourcing service, or tell us what you need verified.
What should a buyer actually request before confirming an order?
Five documents cover the questions a health certificate alone does not answer.
| Document | What it confirms | Ask for |
|---|---|---|
| Export health certificate | Food-safety compliance for the specific consignment | Certificate number, issuing NAFIQPM office, and the establishment code it references |
| Establishment listing status | The processing plant is currently authorised to export to your destination market | Current listing status and code, checked against the current list, not a screenshot from onboarding |
| Catch certificate (wild-caught only) | The fish was landed by a registered, tracked vessel | Vessel registration number and catch area |
| Traceability record | The processed product links back to a specific catch or farm batch | Batch or lot number tying the shipment to its catch or harvest record |
| Certificate of origin, where a trade preference is claimed | Origin for tariff purposes — a separate question from food safety or catch legality | The specific form your destination and trade agreement require — see proof of origin from Vietnam by destination |
Frequently asked questions
1. Is NAFIQAD still the body that issues Vietnamese seafood health certificates?
No. NAFIQAD’s functions now sit with the National Agro-Forestry-Fisheries Quality, Processing and Market Development Authority (NAFIQPM), following mergers of the quality-assurance and processing-development functions, and NAFIQPM itself now sits under the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment, formed in March 2025.
2. Does a health certificate confirm the fish was caught legally?
No. It confirms food-safety compliance. Whether the catch itself was legal — landed by a registered, tracked vessel from a permitted area — is a separate question answered by catch and traceability documentation, not the health certificate.
3. Why does the ministry name on some documents look unfamiliar?
Vietnam’s agriculture and environment functions were merged into a single Ministry of Agriculture and Environment in March 2025. A document issued before that date may carry the name of the former Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, which is not itself a sign of a problem, but is a reason to confirm the current issuing authority.
4. Do I need catch documentation for farmed shrimp or fish, the same as for wild-caught product?
Not in the same form. Catch certificates concern wild-caught fisheries. For farmed product, the traceability question shifts to farm and hatchery records rather than a vessel catch certificate.
5. Where do I check whether a specific processing plant is currently listed for export to my market?
Ask NAFIQPM’s current establishment list for your destination market directly, or ask your supplier for their establishment code and confirm it against that list yourself rather than relying on a document the supplier provides.
Checked on 25 September 2026.
Sources:
- Ministry of Agriculture and Environment (formed March 2025, merging the former Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment)
- National Agro-Forestry-Fisheries Quality, Processing and Market Development Authority (NAFIQPM), export seafood establishment listing programme
- Circular 32/2022/TT-BNNPTNT on food safety inspection and certification for exported agro-forestry-fishery products
- European Commission IUU fishing “yellow card” status for Vietnam and Vietnam’s national action plan on IUU fishing