Scottish exports nosedive

The BBC reports that the provisional figures for the first 11 months of last year reveal that exports equated to £353m, down from £457m in the first 11 months of 2014.

Although the volume of salmon sold to Europe rose slightly, sales to the USA and Canada and the Far East dropped by 30 per cent.

The Chief Executive of the Scottish Salmon Producers' Organisation (SSPO), Scott Landsburgh, blamed a variety of factors, including the Russian trade embargo, the comparatively low value of the Norwegian kroner, and the comparatively small size of the Scottish industry.

Speaking on BBC Radio Scotland's Good Morning Scotland programme, he said: “Exchange rates were not in our favour. Our competitor countries had much lower values on their currencies than we had. And we had a glut of salmon on the international markets due to the Russian trade embargo. So these things conspired to make it a very tough year."

He added that the industry in Scotland was keen to grow in order to better meet the demands of markets, such as the USA and China.

"They are the markets that really demand large fish all year round and that's where we have fallen a bit short because we can't fulfil that demand," he said. "We need to get more sites – that's a key factor.”