Salmon Evolution on track to scale up in Norway, narrowing North American search for aquaculture site

Norwegian land-based salmon farmer Salmon Evolution announced in its Q3 2023 report that it lost NOK 36.5 million (USD 3.4 million, EUR 3.1 million) before taxes, but that it also experienced strong biological performance throughout the period, ending with its best-standing biomass to date at its Indre Harøy facility, which attained Aquaculture Stewardship Council (ASC) certification in late October.

The company’s standing biomass on 30 September totaled 2,100 metric tons (MT), doubling the 1,047 MT recorded on 30 June this year for all of H1 2023. Its mortality rate in the three months came out to 1.5 percent, which Salmon Evolution said demonstrated it is “well on its way” to achieving an annual mortality rate between 3 percent and 5 percent.

With its eighth and ninth batches of 80-gram juveniles stocked in August and October, respectively, taking the Indre Harøy farm up to between 1.5 million and 1.6 million fish for the first time, Salmon Evolution began harvesting part of its third batch during the third quarter, obtaining a harvest volume of 185 MT of head-on-gutted (HOG) fish. This took its total harvest for the year to 770 MT HOG.

The expectation for the company is that with the remainder of the third batch harvested in the fourth quarter, its final quarter harvest will be between 1,000 MT HOG and 1,200 MT HOG.

Salmon Evolution CEO Trond Håkon Schaug-Pettersen said Q4 2023 will be the first quarter in which the company can say it’s ...

Photo courtesy of Salmon Evolution