Sweden's long-awaited permit update could benefit the country's land-based aquaculture sector

The government in Sweden is working on measures to speed up permit processes partly to improve the sustainability agenda in a number of sectors, efforts that could potentially benefit the country's land-based aquaculture sector.

"Today, it is common for companies to see the permit processes as a major obstacle," the government said.

The government wants to change this and is therefore prioritizing a series of measures to increase the pace of the relevant permit processes, it said.

Big Akwa is planning a 6,000 metric ton rainbow trout farming facility in Ange in northern Sweden.

"The system generally works well, but there have been examples where the time from start to final permit has been way too long, in some cases several years, " Ahlzen said.

One company for which this long processes has already taken a toll is land-based salmon farmer Smogenlax in western Sweden.

The 2,000 metric ton project has been in the making for six years and is now waiting for a final ruling from the Higher Land and Environment High Court before it proceeds further.

Smogenlax, which has funding in place for the current project, has a partnership in place with Israeli aquaculture supplier AquaMaof.

Moving overseas

In Sweden, said Oresten, it is not the laws per se that need changing, but the processes.

"Local authorities, administrators or courts have no set time tables or expectations as to how long a case can and should take," he said.

The current system hinders the country's development two-ways.

"It is bad for the projects that end up in lengthy waiting processes, but it also deters new companies to even enter the system. Instead, people look abroad and this obviously creates a bad reputation for Sweden, he said.

While the French market is unknown to the company, the country do have clear guidelines and timeline processes in place, Oresten said.

Also Sweden-based fishing company Astrid Fiske has expanded to Denmark where it already has started to harvest salmon from its land-based project.

"So it is not just empty words that entrepreneurs are leaving Sweden," he said, adding that as a Swede, he rather "stay and work in Sweden, so this situation is quite sad for us."

"The system in Sweden is not able to back us, and as a result entrepreneurs are forced abroad. It's pretty bad. "

Over the next year, the government will add SEK 100 million (€8.6 million/$ 9.1 million) to the county administrations and SEK 10 million (€860,000/$ 910,000) to Sweden's Courts so they can streamline their work in handling permit reviews.

"The inquiry will present its findings in December," Cedrum said.

Apart from Smogenlax and Big Akwa, other sizeable land-based aquaculture projects in Sweden include Re:Ocean, which aims to produce 10,000 metric tons of salmon annually at its 58,000-square-meter farm in Saffle, Cold Lake which aims to 4,000 metric-ton Arctic char near Kallsjon, Sotenas Marine Park which has its eyes set on a 100,000 metric tons salmon farm noth of Gothenburg.