M. Shahbandeh
Research expert covering agriculture & FMCG
World fish production is divided into fishing (capture) and aquaculture. In 2023, approximately 90.6 million metric tons of fish were captured, while 96 million metric tons were bred, raised, and farmed through the controlled aquaculture process. Since it started in the 1960s, the farmed salmon industry has grown substantially in the past decades, and today approximately 70% of salmon produced worldwide is farmed. In 2022, more than 2.8 million tons of farmed salmonids were produced. In comparison, only around 640,000 tons of wild salmonids were caught.
Leading producers of farmed salmon
Historically, the biggest player in the salmon industry was Norway, followed by Sweden, Denmark, and Chile. Norway was by far the biggest supplier of salmonids for the U.S., with almost seven million U.S. dollars’ worth of salmon imported into the U.S. in 2022. In 2023, approximately 807.5 million Canadian dollars' worth of Atlantic salmon was exported from Canada, a decrease from around 971 million Canadian dollars worth in the previous year.Atlantic salmon market overview
The worldwide sales value of Atlantic salmon more than tripled its value between the years of 2009 and 2022. From 2016 on, the market price of salmon decreased every year, starting at around 6.72 euros per kilogram and ending at five euros per kilogram in 2020, before jumping back up again in 2022 and 2023. In the past decade, the highest value of the salmon price index was 9.10 U.S. dollars per kilogram in 2016, and the as of 2023 the price was about 8.28 U.S. dollars per kilogram.
