Marine Harvest is on the hunt for a new location in Scotland to build a EUR 105.1 million (USD 114.4 million) fish farm feed plant.
The company anticipates that 55 full time jobs would be initially created with the site, alongside significant employment in related service industries. What’s more, further jobs will be required to build the plant, which is projected to take between a year and eighteen months.
The search comes after the Board of Marine Harvest gave the greenlight to invest in a plant in the Scotland area that will serve to provide feed for use on the company’s Scottish fish farms, as well as its Ireland, Norway and the Faroes locations. The company hopes to replicate the feed success it have seen with its large feed plant in Norway.
“This is a large investment in Scotland and should be welcome news for the host community given the number of jobs. We have a similar plant in Norway which has proved enormously successful,” said Ben Hadfield, the Chief Operating Officer of Feed for Marine Harvest globally as well as the Managing Director of Marine Harvest Scotland.
Added Hadfield: “This plant will allow us to meet our aspirations on sustainability, as well as learn from our experience at the Norwegian plant. For example, it will use Liquid Natural Gas for most of its energy, providing a much reduced carbon footprint over current arrangements. What we have done in Norway has created jobs directly in the local community and also generated employment for local contractors and suppliers. We are in discussions with the owners of a number of sites and are seeking the views of local regulators as well as Highlands and Islands Enterprise and hope to be in a position to make a final decision on a preferred site within the next month.”
Marine Harvest is looking to place the plant in the West of Scotland, a central location where it can be easily accessed by the company’s salmon farms on the West coast of the Highlands, Argyll and Bute and the Western Isles. Furthermore, because all feed will be delivered via boat to area farms, the plant site should be coastal with direct access to an existing jetty or pier, or offer the potential for one to be built, said Marine Harvest; it should also be at least four acres.
The prominent salmon harvester and processor expects that the plant could be up and running as early as 2018.
