International Trade Secretary Liz Truss was encouraging exporters to look east as she visited a company in Liskeard.

Accompanied by MP Sheryll Murray, the Secretary of State was visiting some of Cornwall’s top exporters to discuss new trading opportunities with countries such as Vietnam and Malaysia.

Ms Truss said that new trade deals being negotiated would “create even more export opportunities in Cornwall and across Britain – boosting rural communities and local economies”.

Family-run business Ideal Foods sells seafood products to customers in more than 40 countries – specifically in the Far East, Europe and the USA.

Founded in 2001, the company has seen year-on-year growth for the past 13 years, and of the 11,500 tonnes of fish it sells, 91% is sold overseas. It is well on track to meet its 2020-21 target of £16m turnover, having already dispatched 264 containers this financial year, the same amount as in the previous 12 months.

Thanks to a newly-secured contract with Fife-based Mowi Consumer Products UK, it has now also expanded its sales availability by up to 5,000 tonnes per year.

Ideal Foods says it has prepared for some of the exporting challenges that could arise post-Brexit by securing storage facilities outside of the UK, which it is already using.

Sales director Jeanette Turpin said: “We are delighted to have been visited by Liz Truss MP. As an exporter, it has been so useful for us to meet with the Secretary of State for International Trade to discuss our international trading activities.

“The advice and guidance that we have received from the Department of International Trade (DIT) over the years has helped us in many ways and we will continue to tap into the resources available via DIT as our business grows into new overseas markets in the future.”

MP Sheryll Murray described Ideal Foods as a “successful, outward looking company based here in Cornwall”.

The firm was named Cornwall’s Export Company of the Year 2019, and with its own export department it processes all its own documentation in-house, including health certificates, certificates of origin and bills of lading. Earlier on this year, the company’s own Export Controller, Vicky Jennings, was selected by DIT to become an Export Champion for the South West.

Ideal Foods is a specialist supplier of shellfish, whitefish, tuna, salmon heads and other fish bi-products. Its ethos is to reduce wastage to an absolute minimum by using all parts of the fish, and what can’t be used for human consumption is used in the production of pet foods, sold under the brand Purely Fish.

With its head office in Liskeard, the company has cold storage in Grimsby and satellite offices in Leighton Buzzard and Manila, in the Philippines.