An increase in feed sales, with sales growth lower
After a feverish autumn of record-high feed sales, water temperatures and the number of sunlit hours plummet. That’s the start of salmon’s loss of appetite for feed. According to Lusedata (a Norwegian sea lice counter), the average temperature in Norwegian net pens is now 7.2 degrees Celsius, a shade colder than a year ago.
Over the past month of registered sales, up through Week No. 48, some 141,779 tonnes of salmon feed were sold. That’s a moderate four percent more than for the same period of 2016, the latest edition of Akvafakta (another Norwegian salmon-market service).
Assuming the Norwegian biomass count at the end of November was nine percent higher than what it was a year ago — and that more salmon means more feed eaten — then a drop in feed sales is noteworthy. Akvafakta numbers don’t account for stores of feed kept by salmon farmers.
In all, at the start of December, some 1,508,037 t of farmed-salmon feed has been sold in Norway. That’s a year-on-year increase of six percent.
