TripleNine sells fishmeal to China as fishmeal companies face shortage of raw materials

The shortened Peruvian fishing periodl will increase competition from among fishmeal factories in Denmark and Norway for raw materials around the North Sea, Managing Director of TripleNine Fish Protein, Christian Bisgaard said.

Writing in the company's latest newsletter, Bisgaard said "Peru's fishermen have suffered a major setback due to extremely cold sea water and they will not be able to catch the expected two million tons of fish for the production of fishmeal and fish oil. From 18 January, fishing was completely discontinued in Peru and only approx 36 per cent of the quota of about two million tons has been caught. Fishing will not recommence until April or May.
As a result, the world market will experience a shortage of fishmeal and fish oil".

"It will, however, be very difficult for us to obtain the necessary quantity of raw materials to meet the demand and ensure a sensible exploitation of our capacity because of the reduced quotas for almost all the industrial fish species (apart from sand eel) which have been announced for the waters we normally fish".

"At the moment, it looks as though the reduced quantity of raw materials available will result in a reduction in the Scandinavian factories' production of 110-130,000 tons of fishmeal and approximately 30,000 tons of fish oil".

The Chinese market is particularly likely to feel the loss of the South American fishmeal and the company sees this as an opportunity to expand its market. On a recent visit  the last official approvals were obtained and TripleNine is now approved for exporting fishmeal and fish oil to China. The company reported that they have already managed to sell a major consignment of fishmeal to a Chinese customer. It is the first time since 2001 that a Danish fishmeal factory has sold fishmeal to China.