UK retailers say Norway’s salmon cartel cost them £675m

ASDA supermarket store front

Price-fixing by Norway’s biggest salmon producers cost the UK retailers now suing them £675m. That’s the claim made by the seven supermarket chains that have filed a claim with the UK’s Competition Appeals Tribunal (CAT). It emerged last week, thanks to a trading update from Lerøy Seafood, that a number of UK retailers are taking…

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Canadian seafood giant invests in cod farmer

Fish farm pen in calm sea and sunshine

High Liner Foods, one of North America’s leading seafood companies, has bought a stake in the Norwegian cod farmer, Norcod. The move is an interesting one, because the big Canadian company has not previously been directly involved with aquaculture. High Liner is mainly a marketer and a processor of value-added frozen seafood, with several retail…

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Nova Sea signs £50m slaughterhouse contract

Computer rendering of buildings in Nove Sea's planned slaughterhouse

Norwegian salmon farmer Nova Sea has signed a £50m (NOK 673m) contract to build a new slaughterhouse in Nordland. The deal with the construction company Consto will see an ultra-modern facility on the small island of Lovund. It is in the area where Nova Sea began its fish farming operations in the 1970s. The new…

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Norway February salmon exports value up, but volume down

Fresh seafood on crushed ice at fish market. Raw salmon fillet on display counter at store.

Norway’s seafood export boom continues but there are signs things could be slowing down, according to the latest figures. The export value total last month was NOK 13.3bn (just short of £1bn), a rise of 3% on a year ago. The Norwegian Seafood Council said that thanks to large value growth for salmon, trout, cod…

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Swedish private equity firm buys fish health specialist

Fish health business STIM has been acquired by Swedish investment firm Summa Equity, in a move STIM’s founder said would help the company to grow. STIM is the aquaculture industry’s largest quality supplier of fish health products and services, operating in Norway, Chile, UK, and Canada. Its gross revenue of the company was over €150m…

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Ministers praise Norway-UK partnership

Fisheries ministers from Norway and the UK have stressed the mutual importance of the seafood trading relationship between the two countries – but trade body Salmon Scotland has said the playing field needs to be more level. Cecilie Myrseth, Norway’s Fisheries and Oceans Minister, and Mark Spencer, UK Fisheries Minister (pictured), were speaking at last…

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Salmon prices on the rise again

Salmon prices in Norway appear to be on the rise again after a period of relative stability. Last week (week 8) figures from Statistics Norway, which monitors prices on a weekly basis, fresh salmon reached NOK 111.25 per kilo (£8.31), the second highest level so far this year and an increase of 3.2% on the…

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UK supermarkets join price fixing action against salmon giants

Fresh atlantic salmon on the supermarket counter

A number of British supermarkets are suing Norway’s main salmon companies following a European Union investigation into price fixing. This latest development was disclosed yesterday by the Lerøy Seafood Group, one of the companies facing action. Lerøy said in its Q4 report that the supermarkets issued claims for damages in the UK earlier this month against several Norwegian…

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Lerøy hit by new fish escape

Up to 5,000 mature salmon are feared to have escaped from a Lerøy facility in central Norway in the past few days. Lerøy Midt says it has informed the authorities of the incident, which is thought to have taken place on Tuesday of this week. Harald Larsen, general manager of Lerøy Midt, said the company has quickly…

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Processing software business Maritech acquired by US firm

Seafood processing and logistics software business Maritech has been snapped up by US high-tech group CAI Software. Maritech is a leading cloud-based ERP (enterprise resource planning) provider for the seafood and logistics industries across the European and North American markets. Founded in Norway, Maritech has an expansive, blue-chip customer bases in the seafood industry, offering…

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