Buying local offers defence against salmon tax, suggests Rostein boss
Norway’s salmon farmers would have a stronger argument against a potential tax hit by the government if they stipulated Norwegian-built wellboats as a requirement, Rostein vice president Glen Bradley says.
Everything but the hulls of vessels bought by Rostein, one of the world’s biggest wellboat operators, are built in Norway, whereas other companies tend to send more of the work abroad. Rostein’s parent company, Rofisk AS, owns a 69% in Norwegian shipbuilder Larsnes Mek., which is a trusted supplier to Rostein.
Bradley told Fish Farming Expert’s Norwegian sister site, Kyst.no, that there is a lot of capital in the world that wants to go into wellboats.
“What we’re seeing now is something reminiscent of the contracting race we saw in offshore until 2014,” he said.
“In addition to increased competition from abroad, we also see that the tax debate in the salmon industry has made several farmers very aware that they should contribute to visible ripple effects in Norway.
“Almost all our competitors are owned by foreign funds or listed, so it is up to the salmon producers to decide how relevant the ripple effects of this in Norway are for their company.
“With us, 100% of our wellboats are built in Norway and we will continue to build them here. We believe the build quality we get is very high, and all vessels have been delivered ahead of time, which is very important to us.”
Bradley said Rostein had had a quieter start to the year than in the past.
“This has partly to do with colder temperatures. So, there is a lot of vacant wellboat capacity around the coast now and there are, as is well known, many newbuilds along the way now.”
