After announcing its EUR 140 million (USD 200 million) investment in the Acuinova turbot plant in Mira, Portugal, in 2009 — claimed to be the world’s largest aquaculture plant — Spain’s Pescanova has suspended its expansion plan for at least one year. The Mira plant was forecast to create some 200 direct and 600 indirect jobs.
The company explained that farmed turbot has already reached annual capacity of 10,000 metric tons. Turbot in the plant’s 1,800 pools were expected to reach two kilograms in weight, however, much of it enters the market at around 1 kilogram.
Despite grave uncertainties about the Portuguese economy, Pescanova claim that its investment “will not be affected” because its turbot is sold mostly in Spain, Italy and France.
The company has also suspended construction of a tilapia-breeding and -fattening plant in Mozambique as they “haven’t found a suitable place to locate it,” while also referring to the impact of the Japanese earthquake and tsunami on its current seafood supplies.
Last year, Pescanova’s international sales reached 50 percent of total sales — the highest percentage in the company’s history. In a shareholders statement last week, the company confirmed that 24 percent of total sales came in Europe, excluding Spain, and 14 percent in the United States, with the remaining 12 percent to other countries.
Simultaneously announcing divestment of nearly 29 percent of the firm via the sale of EUR 180 million (USD 258 million) convertible bonds, while also paying EUR 31.9 million (USD 46.7 million) to buy back debt with a nominal value of EUR 26.6 million (USD 38.1 million), company executives confirmed that the convertible bonds process is proceeding “without any problem” and that "data shows that the company remains on steady growth.”
