Supply of Atlantic Salmon Surpasses 260 000 Tonnes WFE

Issues related to higher mortalities, lost growth and harvesting at lower harvest-weights than anticipated, have characterised Scotland, East-Coast Canada, and Iceland.

A couple of months ago, we looked at the latest news for the salmon industry. Back then, we saw that the interest in salmon, both for the product itself and for salmon production capacity or companies, was high in the investments sphere. We were also seeing high salmon prices throughout markets. So, has anything noteworthy changed in the last couple of months? An extraction of the November issue of the Monthly Salmon Report gives us some insight.

As another month passed, we see that October 2021 is the second month ever where the supply of Atlantic salmon surpassed 260 000 tonnes WFE. YoY growth for October is however estimated lower than in September and in Q3, backed also by another month with no increases in feed sales. In terms of this year’s growth period, issues related to higher mortalities, lost growth, and harvesting at lower harvest-weights than anticipated, have characterised Scotland, East-Coast Canada, and Iceland. We also saw that far from all business units reported positive operating margins. Several examples of negative operating EBIT-margins have been presented for Q3-2021.

As we have entered Q4, we also register that a quite notable shift upwards in feed prices are taking place. In a typical raw-material basket for salmon feed, not only marine feed ingredients, but also major commodities of vegetable origin have seen notable price increases. Drivers behind the increase in these price quotes are partly the natural supply/demand equation, with limited or lower supply being a general hurdle for maintaining price levels. In addition, several supply chain related costs have increased notably.

Price achievement for salmon during 2021 have been strong, considering factors such as the pandemic and that supply increase in periods have been far higher than anticipated. Has salmon become less competitive compared to other proteins, or food staples that it is natural to benchmark against? It appears that is not the case but in our latest Monthly Salmon Report edition of the year next month, we will highlight this development with some deeper analysis and comments.

This is an extraction of the Monthly Salmon Report. Want to know more about the latest findings from the world of salmon? Check out our Monthly Salmon Report.

Image: Shutterstock by Strahil Dimitrov