Winter takes heavy toll on Iceland salmon farmer

The company issued the warning in a harvest guidance update to the Oslo Stock Exchange today.

Last autumn Kaldvik reported a harvest guidance of around 15,000 tonnes for 2024 and a considerably higher figure of 25,000 tonnes for this year.

The company harvested a reported 6,668 tonnes in the final quarter of last year and a total of 14,965 tonnes for the entire financial year.

The update also said: “Due to higher mortality caused by winter-wounds in the 2023 generation and less growth than expected due to temperatures lower than expected and normal for the period, the company reduces the harvest guidance for 2025 by 3,500 tonnes to 21,500 tonnes.

“The 2023 generation is the last generation without either the new winter-wound vaccine, developed for Kaldvik AS, or the standard ISA [infectious salmon anaemia] vaccine.”

“Furthermore, in the recent months the company has experienced higher mortality than expected in connection with the release of smolts to the site Einstigi, which as of 21 January 2025 is estimated to be 721,000 smolts.”

Kaldvik AS, known as Ice Fish Farm until May last year, is one of the leading salmon farmers in Iceland, with investment from the Norwegian salmon farmer Måsøval.