More and more fish are being farmed worldwide. Today, nearly half of all fish products produced for human consumption are farmed. In the Netherlands too, the farming of fish for human consumption has grown rapidly since the 1980s, from almost nothing to a production of around 10,000 tons a year. Together with IMARES, LEI has charted this decline in the report ‘Aquaculture in the Netherlands; analysis and an impetus for action'.
Multiple factors
Dutch aquaculture generally seems to be characterised by weak competitive power. This is caused by a relatively high cost price compared with foreign competitors and a lack of unique selling points. Consequently, production generally fails to be sufficiently in line with consumer demands. As a result of the economic crisis, the consumer is also tending to choose cheaper alternatives like frozen or refreshed fish (i.e. previously frozen fish) instead of fresh fish. This refreshed fish competes ‘unfairly’ with fresh fish. In the Netherlands, animal welfare is also a relatively important factor and there is a comparatively strict assessment framework for species designated for production.
Most volumes of Dutch farmed fish are too small to be able to meet the demand of supermarkets and wholesalers, particularly compared with imported frozen fish. In addition, a lack of cooperation between small companies in particular constitutes a barrier to solving these problems. In the Netherlands, the natural circumstances for aquaculture are not optimal and fish are farmed in expensive systems which have seen little improvement in recent years. Furthermore, compared with Asian competitors in particular, the Netherlands has relatively high labour costs. For a number of entrepreneurs, it has also proved difficult to arrange finance for (cost price reducing) investments. Finally, the available knowledge which could lead to a reduction of the production costs is difficult to access.
Opportunities for recovery
The current farmers could be better facilitated with respect to certain points, such as access to knowledge. Another possibility is to develop towards a more market-oriented sector based on flexibility and knowledge exploitation whereby, besides fish, also products like knowledge, system innovations, fish feed and starting material could be (inter)nationally marketed.
Report 2010-025: Aquaculture in the Netherlands; analysis and an impetus for action