Investors lose millions in Spanish tuna farms
Norwegian investors who invested heavily Spanish tuna farms in 2015 have lost almost £4 million after the business encountered problems.
Harald Dahl, one of investors behind tuna company Fortuna Mare, was quoted by Norwegian newspaper Dagens Næringsliv as saying the Spanish farms had achieved some success in fry production, but it was much more difficult than they had anticipated in transporting fish from land to sea, with the fast swimming fish “butting” against the walls of tanks, as a particular problem during transport.
“We got some injuries that resulted in high mortality in both the transport and in the sea,” said Dahl.
According to the newspaper the company brought in a scant NOK 800,000 (£76,000), leading to losses of NOK 40.2 million (£3.8 million), but Dahl insisted he wants to try again.
“The lesson, after spending lots of time and money on this, is that one should be very careful or have broad shoulders when you are dealing with biological risk,” Dahl was quoted as saying. “There will be two steps forward and one back, and one must be able to stand through the process where one must take losses. It's difficult to start up the breeding of a new species, with all the costs that are involved, when you only have private investors on board.”
Tuna in Norway
Jan-Helge Dahl, who was general manager of Fortuna Mare in 2014, then told kyst.no that he envisioned big profits from their tuna-farming.
“Judging from the surveys we've done, I expect that the price per kilo then will lie somewhere between 30-50 euros [£26-£45],” he said (in 2014).
Today he runs the tuna company Nortuna, which kyst.no reported on early this year, the company has just been established in Trondheim and is cooperating with research organisation SINTEF.
In January Jan-Helge Dahl revealed plans to open an establishment in Trondheim had stalled, but he anticipated operations being up and running in the next few months.?
