Hake landings to the port of Lorient came to 330 tonnes in 2022, but this year landings had jumped to 950 tonnes by the end of May.
Local fishing vessels Naoned, Le Dolmen, Carmalia, Annytia, Les Menhirs, and Marie-Lou have been fishing well, and their hake season usually starts in early spring – and this year the hake showed up earlier than usual, and in good amounts.
‘The Spanish boats have also been part of the party. Twenty of them landed at Keroman more than 1600 tonnes, more than triple the amount in 2022’, said Benoît Jaffré, director of Sem de Lorient Keroman.
Working with pelagic pair trawl gear, the Lorient fleet and others from along the west of France – Ablette from Les Sables d’Olonne, Lola Julia from La Turballe and Bougainville from Le Guilvinec – the fleet has been fishing short trips of two to three days to maintain high quality.
Although prices have been down around €0.50 from the €3.14 average last year, the volumes and quality of the hake fishery have made it an attractive option.
‘Almost everything was sold in advance. Any surplus went to Spain. The real difficulty was to find the processing capacity. This used to be sold whole, but now hake is more popular in portions,’ said Jérôme Nicol, operations manager at APAK which has two pairs of trawlers expected to continue fishing for hake until the albacore tuna season opens, which is generally at the beginning of July.
To make even better use of its catches, the company continues to develop new ways of adding value. As well as canned fish, soups and other products sold under the Ty Pesked brand, Apak is working with fishmonger Top Atlantique and processor Cinq Degrés Ouest to come up with more innovative ideas.
