Iceland’s fishermen landed almost ISK 7.5 billion (USD 67.6 million, EUR 58.2 million) worth of seafood in June, up 4.2 percent compared with the corresponding month of 2017. The latest figures issued by Statistics Iceland finds that this rise was due to revenue increases in the demersal and flatfish categories offsetting steep declines in the pelagic and shellfish values.
Iceland’s demersal catch value climbed five percent year-on-year to almost ISK 5.7 billion (USD 51.4 million, EUR 44.2 million), with the cod catch accounting for ISK 3.5 billion (USD 31.5 million, EUR 27.2 million) of the total, up 4.9 percent compared with June 2017.
There were also increases in the catch values of haddock and redfish at ISK 573.9 million (USD 5.2 million, EUR 4.5 million) and ISK 654.7 million (USD 5.9 million, EUR 5.1 million) respectively.
At the same time, the flatfish catch values climbed 14.3 percent to ISK 1.3 billion (USD 11.7 million, EUR 10.1 million).
Meanwhile, the country’s pelagic catch value fell by 30.4 percent to less than ISK 212 million (USD 1.9 million, EUR 1.6 million), with earnings for herring and blue whiting decreasing by 92.6 percent and 16.4 percent respectively.
Icelandic shellfish earnings fell by 14.3 percent to ISK 240.8 million (USD 2.2 million, EUR 1.9 million).
The accumulated total catch value for the 12 months July 2017 through June 2018 increased by 8.4 percent year-on-year to ISK 122.4 billion (USD 1.1 billion, EUR 949.5 million), with increases in the demersal and flatfish catch values of 13.3 percent and 26.4 percent respectively. Conversely, earnings from the pelagic and shellfish sectors decreased by 9.3 percent and 1.5 percent respectively.
During this period, ISK 68.7 billion (USD 619 million, EUR 533 million) worth of Iceland’s total catch went directly for domestic processing (up 15.2 percent), while ISK 18 billion (USD 162.2 million, EUR 139.6 million) worth was sold at auction for domestic processing (up 8.1 percent).
Landings valued at almost ISK 5 billion (USD 45.1 million, EUR 38.8 million) were exported in containers (up 17.3 percent), and the frozen-at-sea catch fell by 3.9 percent year-on-year to ISK 30.5 billion (USD 274.8 million, EUR 236.7 million).
