Skilled jobs boost for Orkney

ORKNEY is to gain six new skilled jobs after Scottish Sea Farms was granted approval for a new salmon farm off Lober Rock close to St Margaret’s Hope in Scapa Flow.

The new £3 million farm has consent to grow 1,274 tonnes of salmon and is expected to go live in 2019.

Consisting of 12 x 80m pens and a 200-tonne barge, it will be managed by a sixstrong team.

Richard Darbyshire, Scottish Sea Farms’ regional production manager for Orkney, said: ‘This latest consent is hugely positive news. For the remote communities in which we live and work, the new farm will bring skilled jobs and training, additional business for local suppliers, and a boost to local economies in terms of increased disposable income.’

The new farm will bring the company’s Orkney estate to eight.The islands’ local geography has helped deliver strong results. Darbyshire said the lack of wild salmon rivers means that sea lice isn’t an issue.

‘Testament to this, we haven’t administered one treatment for Lepeophtheirus salmonis in 10 years of farming in Orkney waters.’

Orkney will now have the capacity to grow more than 10,000 tonnes.