Growth for all types of salmonid fish in Chile has been adjusted down to under 5 percent, in total, the company said in its June report.

Production of Atlantic salmon is growing in Chile and in 2005 will be more than 60 percent of the total.

Last year, Chilean salmon companies harvested 570,000 metric tons (in whole fish equivalents) of all species of salmonid fish: Atlantic salmon, trout and coho salmon.

The production volume is on a par with Norwegian producers, who harvested around 600,000 metric tons WFE of Atlantic salmon and trout, according to Kontali’s figures.

It is expected that in 2005 Chile will sail past Norway as the world’s biggest salmon producer, but the new estimates could indicate that the race could be more of a neck-and-neck affair.

“There is no dramatic factors in our adjusted figures, but it’s been dragging a bit in Chile,” Kontali boss Lars Liabø told IntraFish.

The main reason for the reduced estimate is the period where there has been a break in feeding and reduced releases of smolt. Weather conditions were bad in May. Winter was tougher and colder than normal. There was even snow in the salmon capital of Puerto Montt. Colder seas means reduced growth.

In addition, Chileans have been slightly more beleaguered by disease than usual, and algae blooms were a problem in May.

“But wastage has not been abnormally high,” Liabø said.

He stressed that it is too early to draw hasty conclusions about production for 2005.

Norwegian statistics are based on the calendar year. For Chileans, it is most practical to operate with the Southern Hemisphere's ”salmon year”, which spans from July 1 to June 30.

The calendar year has an unnatural scope for measuring slaughter volume of coho. The high season is midsummer: December and January for Chile. Early slaughtering (December) or late slaughtering (January) has a misleading impact on statistics following the calendar year.

Chilean salmon production estimates downgraded