Akranes ready for capelin

‘Everything is ready. We're expecting the first delivery of capelin tonight and are just waiting for the ship's ETA so we can call out staff for tonight's shift, reports www.megafishnet.com with reference to HB Grandi.

"We expect to have around 30 people working on capelin roe and freezing and will probably be running double shifts, to start with, at least,' said Gunnar Hermannsson, production manager in charge of capelin roe production at HB Grandi's factory in Akranes where the question of the day is whether Ingunn AK or Faxi RE will arrive with the season's first landing of capelin.

Both ships are now fishing off Akranes, so the steaming time to port should be short.

According to Gunnar Hermannsson, the capelin's roe percentage is still uncertain, although he says that the roe's stage of development is a more critical factor that the percentage.

‘Roe needs to be 80% developed to be suitable for the Japanese market. Less developed roe goes to Eastern Europe,' he said and commented that production at Akranes is limited by the factory's 100 tonne-per-day freezing capacity. Production capacity in grading, cleaning and drying roe for freezing is higher and the plant can handle 160 to 180 tonnes per day.
‘During the last two capelin seasons, we were sending between 60 and 80 tonnes of roe by truck to Vopnafjördur every day, but with this season's small quotas, it's not certain that we'll have to do that this time,' Gunnar Hermannsson said.