CHINA has ordered a crackdown on seafood exporters as part of efforts to defuse widening trade friction over tainted consumer goods a month after the US banned some Chinese aquatic products on safety concerns.

Local inspection agencies must scrutinise and validate the accreditation of exporters of seafood to the United States, while health certification and monitoring processes must be toughened, China's Certification and Accreditation Administration said in a statement on its website.

China's seafood exports fell 1.5 per cent in the first five months of this year after its trading nations imposed tougher quality standards, the Beijing-based customs office said earlier.

But Mr Steve Dickinson, a partner at law firm Harris Moure in Shanghai, said it was difficult for the government alone to stop unsafe seafood from leaving the country. The onus was also on US importers to purchase seafood from reputable Chinese companies.

Mr Dickinson added that the quality of most seafood products from China was among the highest in the world.

The US Food and Drug Administration has put on hold all farm-raised shrimp, catfish, basa, dace and eel seafood imports from China until they are shown to be free of residues from drugs that are not approved in the US.

'My clients tell me this whole issue has largely been politicised,' Mr Dickinson said.

He added that it was unfair to cast China's seafood industry in a negative light when the problems were caused by several small and inefficient producers.

BLOOMBERG