The fourth quarter of 2024 concluded a challenging year for Frøya, Norway-headquartered salmon-farming company SalMar, but according to CEO Frode Arntsen, the firm achieved biological and financial improvements in the period’s closing weeks, presenting a brighter outlook for the opening quarter of 2025.
Delivering the company’s Q4 report, Arntsen said 2024 featured harvest volumes and financial results that were negatively impacted by environmental challenges, including jellyfish and sea lice.
“SalMar’s focus is always forward,” he said. “We must continue and strengthen the work that SalMar has done since 1991 – ensuring good interaction with the environment that we operate in to optimize in relation to fish, people, and values.”
Despite the challenges, 2024 gave SalMar some valuable lessons and knowledge that the company will use this year, Arntsen said.
“The setup, built over time at SalMar, has been very important. Our belief in large, local harvesting and processing capacity near where we farm has been crucial. At the same time, we see that the foundation and philosophy of our operations remain just as relevant and strong – the right location, the right smolt, the right technology, the right feed, and the right handling by people who always want to do a little more and [who] care. This is the core and guiding principle at SalMar every single day,” he said. “Although we have not found absolute solutions to our challenges, it strengthens our belief in the way forward and the volume potential we have in our value chain.”
In Q4 2024, SalMar harvested 73,800 metric tons (MT) of salmon – almost 10,000 MT less than in the corresponding period of 2023. This contributed to a full-year 2024 total of 231,800 MT, which was 22,300 MT short of 2023’s record harvest.
Its Q4 operating revenues totaled NOK 7.88 billion (USD 707.6 million, EUR 676.3 million) – down from over NOK 8 billion (USD 718.4 million, EUR 686.6 million) in Q4 2023, while its operational EBIT amounted to NOK 1.49 billion (USD 133.8 million, EUR 127.9 million), compared with NOK 2.19 billion (USD 196.7 million, EUR 188 million) previously.
Broken down by harvest area, SalMar Aker Ocean, of which SalMar owns 85 percent, harvested no fish in Q4 2024. Its latest production cycles for both its Arctic Offshore Farming and Ocean Farm 1 operations are now underway, with planned harvesting in the first and second quarters of 2025.
With a harvest of 6,500 MT in Q4, SalMar’s Icelandic Salmon operations generated operating revenues of NOK 586 million (USD 52.6 million, EUR 50.3 million), compared to NOK 605 million (USD 54.3 million, EUR 51.9 million) in the same period of 2023.
Scottish Sea Farms, of which SalMar owns 50 percent, harvested 9,000 MT in Q4, compared with 4,600 MT in the same period a year ago. Its operating revenues were NOK 965 million (USD 86.7 million, EUR 82.8 million) – up from NOK 497 million (USD 44.6 million, EUR 42.7 million).
“We are reasonably satisfied with the overall results for the quarter. It is good that we saw an improvement in the biological situation,” Arntsen said.
For 2025, the firm’s volume guidance remains unchanged, with Norway expected to harvest 254,000 MT, Scotland expected to harvest 32,000 MT, Iceland expected to harvest 15,000 MT, and SalMar Aker Ocean expected to harvest 9,000 MT.
So far in 2025, SalMar has set its sights on further expanding Norwegian operations. In February, it officially completed the purchase of a controlling stake in AS Knutshaugfisk. The company currently has 3,466 MT maximum allowed biomass (MAB) in licenses and four farming locations in Production Area 6 in Mid-Norway.
Also in February, SalMar and Wilsgård Sea Service, who together own 75 percent of the shares in salmon-farming company Wilsgård, have agreed to work together to further develop their ownership interests in Wilsgård.
Wilsgård has operations in production areas 11 and 12 in Northern Norway, with 5,844 MT MAB.
“SalMar looks forward to working more closely with Wilsgård in the future,” Arntsen said.
He further explained that the majority of value chain investments SalMar makes this year will be in improving fish welfare, specifically pursuing a strategic shift toward utilizing preventative technologies – including submerged, closed, and semi-closed systems and laser innovations – in entire farming zones rather than individual sites to reduce sea lice pressure, with the expectation that these measures will reduce the number of treatments needed, reduce mortality, improve quality, reduce costs, and increase volume.
Arntsen said that at the end of 2024, 20 percent of SalMar’s sites were equipped with preventative technologies. This year, the target is to increase the total to 40 percent of its locations.
“In sum, this strengthens our performance in both biology and finance,” Arntsen said.
