Blames it on the government.
This only weeks after Lerøy openly suggested redundancy might be an option for them due to the situation in the market.
“This is primarily an absolutely terrible situation for our skilled employees who are being made redundant and their families, but also for all the rest of us in Lerøy. Unfortunately, the redundancies will also affect our suppliers and customers,” CEO Henning Beltestad writes in a press release.
Beltested says that the decision has been made because of the uncertainty surrounding the ground rent tax, and blames on the government for the sad situation.
“Although we have worked intensively for over a month to get contracts in place with our customers, we have not succeeded. To process the salmon, we have to have long-term contracts, and this market is almost completely gone after the government’s proposal to triple the tax and the model they use, writes the executive director,” he adds.
According to E24, who reported on the matter first, it will affect jobs in the fish processing part of the operations in Norway, where the layoff notices are distributed as follows:
-Lerøy Aurora, Skjervøy, 158 employees have been given a notice.
-Lerøy Midt, two plants at Hitra, 125 employees have been given a notice.
-Lerøy Fossen, Osterøy, 56 employees have been given a notice.
Beltested himself says that he wants to keep as many jobs as possible along the Norwegian coast.
“We no longer hmavefac the opportunity to do that. The market opportunities for processed Norwegian salmon are more or less completely gone after the government’s tax proposal. The result is that we do not have work to offer many of our employees and then we have no other choice but to notify layoffs.”
