World Fishing & Aquaculture has learned that Norwegian fish processor, Norway Seafood Group, has had to suspend production at two of its filleting plants and one saltfish plant, due to the challenging cod market.
Thomas Farstad, CEO, Norway Seafoods, said to World Fishing & Aquaculture: The market is difficult for all kinds of cod products. We are therefore reducing our capacity to reduce inventory build up.
Mr Farstad added: We will monitor the situation closely hopefully we can reopen the plants, but we might also have to consider further closures.
At the moment though, he says that production is going well at all other plants, raw material is in abundance and the products are of continued high quality.
The company is a major supplier of whitefish and other seafood, especially to the European market. It focuses on the sale and production of cod, haddock and saithe. It offers a wide range of products including natural, salted, salted and dried, ready to serve, ready to eat and products with sauce and toppings.
Until it got into trouble, the company was operating nine primary processing facilities (Eight in Norway and one in Denmark), and five secondary production facilities (One in Norway, two in Denmark and two in France). The primary processing facilities specialise in packing whole fish and fillets, both fresh and frozen.
The secondary processing facilities prepare a variety of consumer products, such as fresh fish in MAP, ready meals, and sushi.
Mercator Media Ltd 2013