Record shows that in 2005 Norwegian purseseiners and industrial trawlers landed more than 135,000 tonnes of raw material to Danish fishmeal plants. But recently this year only 10,500 tonnes had been landed. Almost the entire total had been bought by Hanstholm Fish Meal Factory in Hanstholm.
Official figure revealed that fish processing firm Triplenine of Skagen had only bought 220 tonnes. Another nine tonnes had been discharged to an unknown buyer in Hirtsthals. There are now only three fishmeal plants in operating in Denmark and these are located in Skagen, Hanstholm and Thyborøn.
Norwegian industrial trawlers fishing for Norway pout, blue whiting and sand eel, have often made an extra profit by selling their fish bycatch of saithe, cod, ling, plaice and other species at Danish auctions. In particular, large saithe fetched a premium price at Danish auctions.
Managing director Peter Jensen at Hanstholm Fishmeal Factory told that there have not been many Norwegian vessels this year. The large purse seiner and pelagic trawler Libas unloaded 2,000 tonnes of blue whiting on 1 April. This was a very large catch for them. The dramatic fall of the blue whiting quotas in the Northeast Atlantic is an important factor behind the increase in the price on raw material caught by Norwegian vessels.
Jensen said that they will not buy Norwegian raw material at prices at a loss for us. The possibility to buy Norwegian raw material is also influenced by the prices of whitefish at auction. If they are too low then there would little profit in steaming to Denmark. Hanstholm Fishmeal Factory celebrated their 40 year anniversary earlier this year.
