While Icelandic pelagic vessels are busy fishing blue whiting west of Ireland, this is the time of year when they would usually be in the midst of the winter capelin season. Although there were hopes that enough capelin would be located to allow the fishery to begin, it is not clear that this isn’t going to happen.
Extensive research surveys have been carried out in recent weeks, with both research vessels and commercial pelagic vessels surveying fishing grounds around Iceland, and the conclusion has been that there is not sufficient capelin for a fishery to take place this year.
A group of Japanese buyers have been waiting in the east of Iceland for the capelin fishery to begin, as Japan is a key market for both frozen capelin and frozen capelin roe, and for the first time in years the buyers from Japan will have to return home empty-handed.
Local authorities in areas of Iceland where the annual capelin fishery is a key part of the economy are looking at the options.
In the meantime, the pelagic fleet is fishing for blue whiting deep west of Ireland, and three vessels landed more than 6000 tonnes of blue whiting to Síldarvinnslan’s Neskaupstaður and Seyðisfjörður fishmeal plants in the last few days.
According to skipper Tómas Kárason on Síldarvinnalan’s Beitir, the fishing has been good in spite of difficult weather conditions, with one haul of 470 tonnes after towing for only a few minutes.
‘The fishing go inside the EEZ and out again, and we have to take it while it’s outside the line,’ he said, commenting that there are Danish, Norwegian and Dutch vessels fishing inside the line in EU waters.
‘Some time in March the blue whiting will migrate northwards and then stays mainly in the Faroese zone. We’re confident that we will be able to do a few more trips west of Ireland before the fishery slows down. The problem is that these fishing grounds are so far, and when we started steaming home we had a 618 nautical mile steaming time ahead of us.’
There is also currently uncertainty over access to Faroese waters for the Icelandic fleet, since last year’s agreement on blue whiting between Iceland and the Faroe Islands was not renewed this year.
