Scottish salmon exports plunged by 23% last year

The statistics from Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC) show that exports of Scottish salmon fell by 23% in 2020 to 72,155 tonnes, compared to 2019 when 94,315 tonnes were exported.

The export value of whole, fresh Scottish salmon fell by £168 million (27%) in 2020 to £451m, from £619m in 2019.

China down by 76%

Distant markets were hit hardest as the pandemic greatly restricted air transport. Scottish salmon sales in China were down 76% by value and sales to the US were worth 42% less.

Exports of Scottish salmon to the EU became more important in 2020, accounting for 69% of all global sales by volume (50,000 tonnes) and 64% by value (£288m), an increase in proportion from 56% and 52% respectively in 2019.

Tavish Scott, chief executive of the Scottish Salmon Producers’ Organisation (SSPO), said farmers were confident exports would revive as markets opened up and that 2021 would be a good year for the sector.

But he warned today that the greater emphasis on Europe has now left producers even more vulnerable to the problems caused by Brexit.

Covid and Brexit double whammy

Scott said the pandemic, followed by the Brexit end-of-transition change, had been a hard for the sector. “This has been a double whammy,” he said. “The last year has been a bruising time for the Scottish salmon sector, as these new figures show. Our producers have battled really hard to get salmon to their customers around the world, against really strong head winds.

“It is to their credit that they have managed to get so much salmon to their global customers and the switch to EU trade was a good way of offsetting the difficulties experienced elsewhere.

Burden of bureaucracy

“But now that the UK has left the EU and the full implications of Brexit are clear, our members are suffering from the burden of excessive bureaucracy and red tape which is making it difficult for them to compete in the European market.

“That is why we appealed to both the UK and Scottish governments to come together with experts from across our sector and supply chain, to find ways of streamlining the red tape and giving our members the certainty of getting fish to the EU markets on time.”

A disatrous start

Celine Kimpflin, head of markets at Scottish Sea Farms, the third-largest producer of Scottish salmon, said the first week of January, when Brexit’s new rules kicked in, had been an “utter disaster” for salmon exporters.

“We knew it was going to be difficult but we didn’t expect it to be this difficult,” said Kimpflin. “I don’t think as a country we were that well prepared in terms of bureaucracy.”

Kimpflin said health certificates which should take half an hour to complete sometimes took as long as 10 hours to process.

Exports halved

Scottish Sea Farms exports around 200 tonnes of salmon to the EU a week, but this has been reduced by as much as half at the moment.

Kimpflin welcomed the creation of the government task force which met today for the first time and is designed to help streamline the system.

But she said an even better solution would be to invite EU officials to Scotland and show them how the salmon sector operates.

“We need to have a dialogue, work out how we can make the export process more streamlined and give them confidence to import our product.

“At the end of the day though, we have good relationships with our customers built up over the years and it is not the company they have a problem with. That gives me real hope.”