The Icelandic fishing fleet caught 157,277 metric tons (MT) of seafood last month, a decrease of 22 percent compared with March 2017, with decreases in the volumes of whitefish, pelagic fish, and shellfish landed, according to the latest preliminary figures issued by Statistics Iceland.
A total 53,299 MT of demersal species were landed in March (down six percent), with cod accounting for 31,564 MT (down eight percent), haddock at 4,142 MT (down 16 percent), saithe at 6,340 MT (up 22 percent) and redfish at 6,961 MT (down one percent).
Pelagic landings for the month, meanwhile, dropped by 29 percent year-on-year to 100,969 MT, which was driven by a 38 percent reduction in the capelin catch to 81,698 MT.
At the same time, the shellfish catch increased by 28 percent to 589 MT.
Statistics Iceland also found that the flatfish catch increased by 24 percent to 2,420 MT.
The accumulated total catch for the year April 2017 through March 2018 increased by 15 percent to more than 1.2 million MT, with landings of demersal (472,649 MT), pelagic (724,926 MT) and flatfish (24,112 MT) species, rising by 16 percent, 15 percent, and 13 percent respectively. The shellfish volume for the 12 months reached 10,207 MT, down 12 percent.
