Bakkafrost
BY VINCE MCDONAGH
Game changers Faroes-based operator Bakkafrost is showing faith in its Scottish acquisition
B
akkafrost has made it clear it is ready to spend big in order to reshape the Sco�sh Salmon Company. The Faroese salmon farming group has set aside an investment programme totalling around £180m – or £45m (DKK 400m) a year between now and 2024, which they intend to be a game changer. The investment programme for the Faroe Islands is es�mated at DKK 1.8bn (£207m). A sizeable part of the money for Scotland will be used to fund the building of three large hatcheries to increase smolt capacity so it eventually becomes self-sufficient in providing large smolt. The first of these will be at the company’s exis�ng Applecross hatchery, currently being expanded and equipped with RAS (recircula�ng aquaculture system) technology. Suitable sites for the next two large hatcheries are s�ll under considera�on. When Bakkafrost acquired the Sco�sh Salmon Company in October 2019 for around £520m it made it clear that considerable investment would be needed. The group operates 44 marine sites on the West Coast of Scotland and
the Hebridean Islands with 74,765 tonnes of current permi�ed licence volume. It also owns a unique Na�ve Hebridean broodstock programme producing pure Sco�sh Island salmon, originally bred from wild stock and farmed only in Hebridean waters. This, says the company, results in a strong, lean and no�ceably firmer fish than with other Atlan�c salmon. SSC operates two harvest sta�ons, Arnish Point in the North of Scotland and Ardyne in the south of the country with a total daily capacity of 266 tonnes, along with two processing factories and a smokehouse. Bakkafrost says the farming situa�on in Scotland is improving albeit gradually, although the second half of last year was more challenging, especially during the final quarter when SSC suffered excep�onally high mortality rates at
Left: A Bakkafrost farm in the Faroes Opposite from top: The Faroes coastline
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Bakkafrost and Scotland - Vince.indd 30
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12/04/2021 16:03:11
