Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and very welcome to the presentation of Baggerfrost Third Quarter 2020. First, we will go through the summary of the quarter and then we will look into the markets and sales before we look into the segments and financials and ESG and then finally, the outlook for the next quarter and the coming years. Paccafrost harvested in the Faroe Islands 11,130 5 tonnes in the 3rd quarter compared with 12,938 last year. In Scotland, we harvested 10,476 tonnes in the quarter. The feed sales in the quarter were 39,869 tonnes compared with close to 34,000 last year.
The raw material purchase in the quarter were 24,000 tonnes compared with close to 18,000 tonnes last year. The revenues for the group were NOK1123 1,000,000 compared with NOK996 1,000,000 last year. Operational EBIT for the group were €103,000,000 compared with €303,000,000 last year. The cash flow from operations were NOK 105 1,000,000 compared with NOK779 1,000,000 last year. We had positive operational EBIT for the segments in the Faroes, but negative for Scotland.
If you look into the summary of the quarter, we see that the EBITDA increased, decreased from $373,000,000 to $188,000,000 We see that the segments year on year in Faroes on EBIT decreased from 26, 25 last year to 15, 24 this year, the combined EBIT in Faroe Islands. In Scotland, we had a negative EBIT margin of NOK3.89 per kilo Norwegian per kilo. The WAP segment went down from 9.23% last year to 5 percent this year. And the feed the fishmealoilandfeed segment decreased the margin from 19.5% to 14.4%. So all segments reduced their margin compared with last year.
If you go into the market and sales, we see that the big change there are some big changes in the markets in this quarter, mainly that the Western European market increased their share up to 56% from 45% last year. In Scotland, the share is 92% and in Faroes, 56%. North America increased from 23% to 24%. Percent, the Scottish share is 7%. In Asia, the share went down from Faroes from 24% to 9%.
And in Eastern Europe, this year increased from 8% to 11%. We also had increases in the internal use of raw materials in the Faroe Islands from 29% up to 48%. And this year is mainly on contracts. When we look into the markets, we see that the year and also this quarter is very much impacted by the development of the COVID-nineteen. We had the first wave in the first and second quarter and then we have had the second wave in the third and fourth quarter, which has impacted the market severely.
The Western European market is the largest salmon market in the world. It has shown good development but the prices are severely impacted. The North American market is very important for Baccafrost. We have a high focus in the market. We have increased our sales to this market, and we have also strengthened our position in the market.
And the new factory is starting up these days with production. So that gives us new flexibility, increased fill in capacity in the market with delivery directly out to the stores with fresh products on a daily basis and also increased product mix. And the development so far has given us very good feedback from the marketplace. So we see also an improved possibility with 2 origins in the market, both the Scottish origin and also the Faroe's origin in the market with daily deliveries of fresh high quality salmon. The Asia market is also important for us.
We have seen that especially during since June, July when Beijing was under lockdown, it has never it did never came back. There have been the demand has been eradicated by the coronavirus and lockdown measures. But there is some there are some small signs that there are improvements. There are some new airlines starting up, direct routes to Beijing and this could have a positive impact. So we hope to see some positive changes in that market.
In Eastern Europe, Baccaratas has again made been made green to export to Russia, which we also see some impact in this quarter with increased sales. It has been an issue since February, then we will reopen by end of August. For Baccafrost, it is important to have a good flexibility in the marketplace. And contracts for the VAP for the next 12 months are already about 30% for the Faroe's operation And for the Scottish operation, we are at a contract or contract and commitment level of around 22% 25%. It seems like we there are some new customers, but main is that existing customers are buying more than before.
If you look at the global markets, we see a very negative trend during 2020. The prices have declined steadily. There were some positive indications by the end of the second quarter, which then came to an end when we saw the Beijing incident with the fish market there. And in the 3rd quarter, there has been a steady downward trend on the summer prices. So year on year the prices went down from NOK50.35 to NOK48.43 in this quarter, around NOK2.
Quarter on quarter, we see a drop of around NOK11 from NOK59, NOK36 to NOK48, NOK43. On top of that, we also have as Bakenfrost doesn't have our operating currency in Norwegian kronor, We have a significant impact by the weak Norwegian kroner, which is still quite weak compared with a year ago. On the bottom of the chart, we see the development in prices and volumes, despite volumes quite weak compared with some earlier years, there has been a negative trend in the prices. However, in some months there have been some increases in the volumes. Especially here in the last months, we have seen volumes coming into the markets that probably were not planned so.
If you go to the development in on the supply side, we see that the overall global harvest increased in this quarter by 5%. The development overall in Europe was quite flat. There were some issues in Norway in biology. U. K.
Were also impacted, Scotland by biological incidents. The supply side from Americas grew around 13% mainly from Chile, where they have had quite good development in the quarter with good fish and low level of incidence and biological issues. If you look at the numbers from the different regions, we see that Norway had an average weight of 4.1 kilo in the quarter compared with 4.2 last year. Feed sales in Norway were 4.7% up in the quarter versus last year. And on the biology side, there were more than normal harvest driven by requests from authorities to harvest fish because of disease and sea life.
There have been a number of reports about that. According to Contali, more issues with productivity and biology this year and 2020 is the worst year on winter wounds ever in Norway. So that has had a negative impact on the supply side from Norway. In Scotland, the average weight of harvest in this quarter was 4.5 compared with 4.6 last year. The feed sales were flat.
There were biology issues in the quarter with algae blooms, jellyfish and other biological issues in some areas, which had negative impact on the supplies from Scotland. In Faroes, the average size in general for Faroe Islands were 100 gram down to 5.2 compared with 5.3. However, Baccarat was at 5.4. Feed sales 3% down in the quarter. Biology slightly on the negative side.
There were some issues. So the mortality is slightly higher this year than last year. The stocking this year of Smalls and Faroes is quite strong, €5,700,000 in total for Faroe Islands. And the average weight for the whole Faroe Islands in the quarter was 367 gram, which is significantly up from 266 last year. So that means that biomass that has been stocked in the Faroe Islands this year is 150% up from last year.
So it's a strong trend that in Faroe's the smolts are getting larger. In Chile, we see a strong development with larger fish, and they have had less issues. So they have been performing very good on the harvested fish. But last during the last couple of quarters the stocking has been quite low, that will impact the supply from next year. So if you go into the market side and look at the markets, we see that there is 3.8% increase on the demand.
And the difference between the total supply increase of around 5% and this 3.8% are some inventory movements, especially in Chile. The EU grew 7%, which is quite impressive, 20,000 tonnes more in the market. The U. S. Market grew 10%, So those 2 combined are the largest summer markets in the world, around 70% of the whole number.
And they had the highest growth or some of the highest growth. We see especially that the Chinese market have been very negatively impacted in this quarter. And this is purely to the due to the corona development. 37% down in China and 6% down for ASEAN. When we look at the EU market, we see that the demand is driven by the retail.
That seems to be a very big channel into the processors in EU, which has increased their production significantly. The U. K. Demand is also picking very good up and we have a lot of new inquiries in Scotland, a very high interest for the products and also for the provenance and the values that we have in our production there. We also see there high interest in e commerce.
We also see a new trend with fish fish ones driving into areas with products. We also see boxes with fish to be delivered by mail so that people can sign up to get regular deliveries. So there are new initiatives in the market. In the U. S, we see also very high growth.
And in the U. S, we think that this has been very much a push driven growth because of markets which have closed in other areas. From sources about food service, the indications are that takeaway and delivery are expected to be here to stay. So that means that the market is changing a bit. Restaurants are working to make those experiences better, menus are updating accordingly.
And consumers are still concerned about the virus, which are keeping them away from traditional dine in. We think, however, and these are also the indications that we see, that restaurants will be back. Restaurants will be back when the vaccine is out there and when people feel more safe. So there will be some recovery time. And until then, the grow will be muted.
But when the market will be more confident in the new vaccines, we are sure that the market will be back. So it's a matter of time and I think it might not be that long as we had good news yesterday. On the next page there is an overview on the general outlook on the supply side and this is an update from last quarter, some minor changes, not any dramatic change. We see that it's quite flat from the Q3 into the Q4 and also into the Q1, then the drop starts. There will be a negative slide on the supply side for the rest of 2021 where we will see especially from Chile that there will be a significant drop of supply especially from May, June next year.
And that will impact the global market so that the total supply increase next year is expected to be only around 1%. But if we compare the first half of the year and the second half of the year, there's a big difference. Next year Norway is 5% up from 13.49 to 14.30 And Chile is 10% down from 750 7,000 tonnes to 681,000 tonnes. So that means that Chile is something like 80,000 tonnes down in volume next year. Scotland is around flat, 1% up, Faroe's slightly up, 4% and others are increasing their supplies, especially Iceland.
So I believe that the market balance next year will be tight. Of course, the corona development is expected to have some impact, especially during this winter, but I think that we will see some changes that site when we enter into 2021. Going into the segments, the farming site in the Faroe Islands have harvested 11,135 tonnes this quarter, slightly 14% down from last year. The majority of the harvest is from the north, 48% and the west are at 42% and the south 10% of that volume. Scotland 10,400 and 76 tonnes.
The average weight in the Faroe Islands came in at 5.35 compared with 5.5 last year and Scotland at 5.2. The transfer of small to the faroes were 50% up from 2,400,000 to 3,600,000 and in Scotland at €1,300,000 The average weight in the faroes increased from 193,000,000 to 2 95 grams, significantly up. In Scotland, average weight are still at 93 grams. And the water temperatures in the Faroe Islands are unchanged. If we move to the next page, there's an overview of the revenue on the EBIT.
The operational margin in this quarter 18% compared with 33% last year. The operational EBIT dropped from DKK231 1,000,000 to DKK97 1,000,000 from 33% to 18% and the revenue from €693,000,000 to €530,000,000 So these are mainly driven by the top line, but the prices on salmon were very much impacted by the corona development. On the next page, there is an overview of the operational EBIT per kilo. In the Faroe Islands, the pure margin on farming and this is if everything was sold on spot, dropped from 23.61 to 12.43. But as we know, a share of our sales are on contracts, but that is in the VAP on this page.
The Scottish operations came in with a negative EBIT at €3.89 in this quarter. The average weight in the north was 5.1. Lambavrook had 40% of the total harvest in the quarter, that is empty now and that was also at 5.1 kilo. Ottenofjord started harvest in that quarter and Ottenofjord continues also in the Q4 and came in at 5.4 kilos. In the West, the whole volume in the quarter was at 5.6%, 42% of the volume and that was from Gulin.
And Gulin was also active in the quarter. In the South, the whole volume came from Fropa, that was 10% of the total volume of Faroe Islands and the average weight was 5.6 kilos and that continues also into the 4th quarter. Good development there. In Scotland, the harvest was 41% from the north and 59% from the south. Costs are slightly up in Scotland in this quarter around 40 0.4 pounds and mainly due to biological issues.
We had some challenges and had some mortality, which amounts to around NOK 6 per kilo in extra cost. If you look at the bright side, we see that in Scotland, TTC, the growth improved 30% this quarter compared with last year, 30%. The TGC improved 30% and the FCR, FEED conversion rate, improved 8% compared with last year. So there are also good development, but the main driver for negative growth are the mortality incident, which had a high impact on the cost and on mortality. Selling price is £1 down per kilo from last year to this quarter from last Q3 last year to this.
The premium there's a premium on Scottish salmon, and our obtained premium this quarter is NOK 5.3 per kilo. So that's it's a high quality and they are doing a good job to get a premium and do a good selling of the fish and the marketing. I think especially the values with provenance quality of the fish is appreciated in the market. If we move to the value added products, we see in this quarter that this is a record high quantity for our Q3, 5,313 tons never before have we delivered so much into the market. However, we have built some inventories and this is due to contracts that are in place.
So there are inventories built up in the VAP, which are sold in the Q4. That's also why compared with the revenues, the operational EBIT, the margin is slightly lower because some of the revenues are still kept on stock. And as market prices dropped in the quarter, there's a negative impact by that. The revenues increased from €217,000,000 to €247,000,000 and the margin decreased from €26,000,000 to €22,000,000 compared to last year. The operational EBIT dropped from NOK923 1,000,000 to NOK5.87 1,000,000 and this year of WAP of the volume increased from 29% to 48% of the volume.
Retailers have increased their space for consumer packed goods in the shops. So we have better space to deliver our products into the market. Consumer packed goods are seen as safe because you don't touch the product. And there are new ways of getting the products out to the consumer. There are new ideas, both in the retail segment, but also in the retail also in the Horeca segment.
The higher demand for WAP products that we see now is more than we have seen ever before. And the ability and flexibility to meet the need in the market for safe and healthy products has been vital for Baccafrost during this pandemic. We have never ever before produced this much quantity. If you look into the fish meal oil and feed, we see that Hafsblen has for the 1st 9 months received 211,400 tonnes of raw material compared with 243,000 tonnes the same period last year. In this quarter, the EBITDA margin dropped from €94,000,000 to €69,000,000 and again, as in the VAP, we have also built inventories in Hafsbloom.
As we see on this page, the fish meal sold externally in this quarter was only 2,700 tonnes compared with 10,200 last year and that's mainly driven by an increased inventory because we kept more fish meal internally. We had some fear that Blue White ink could lose certification. So it was important for us to keep stocks to protect our internal production for next year. So we have more or less enough inventories for next year. The EBITDA margin therefore dropped from 19.5% to 14.4% and the external fish meal sold dropped from 10,200 to 2,700 tonnes.
Raw material sourced 7,845 tonnes up to 24,100 tonnes. The ISIS recommendation for blue widening for next year is 20% down to 960,000 tonnes compared with 1162,000 tonnes this year. The coastal states agreed about the total quota, but have yet not agreed about how they share the quota, which is critical to continue with certificate catches with certified catches. Based on this, back office expect a decrease in production next year. Volumes of fish meal and fish oil will therefore go slightly down compared with this year.
On the next page there is an overview on the feed market. In this quarter our sales of feed increased up to 40,000 tonnes, close to 40,000 tonnes compared with 34,000 last year. So 6,000 tonnes up. The external feed sale decreased from 7,700 to 5,500. So the increase is mainly based on internal sales.
The Faroeys segment internally used 28,300, which is around 71% of the sale. And in Scotland, we used 6,000 tonnes from Hafsblon. So the combined internal sale was 86%. We see on this page also that raw material prices have dropped and drop of raw material prices is positive because that means that we are needing to pay less for our raw material prices. And then Hakan Jakarsson, our CFO, will take us through the financials and ESG.
I'll go through the financials with you. Before I begin, just please be aware that the Q3 of 2019, which we do a comparison with, does not include numbers for Scotland as we did not have the numbers consolidated into our accounts until Q4 of last year. So if we start with the revenue for the entire group, we are up and our revenue amount to €1,100,000,000 roughly for the entire group. If we then exclude the Scottish Schammer company in this quarter, we actually see that we are down by 2.90 $1,000,000 on revenues as the Faroe East part of the operation has a revenue of 706,000,000 dollars In regards to the operational EBIT, we are down from $303,000,000 in the Q3 of 2019 to $103,000,000 in this quarter. Again, if we exclude the Scottish Am Company, the revenue for the Faroeys operation is $131,000,000 sorry, the operational EBIT is $131,000,000 in this quarter.
Fair value adjustments are $124,000,000 That is primarily due to a buildup in biomass over the quarter. We are around 9,000 ton up on biomass, but also that we have larger fish, So the fish distribution of the sizes has skewed towards larger fish. Revenue tax has decreased. This is a result of the lower spot prices. So we paid $9,000,000 in revenue tax and $18,000,000 in corporate tax.
Profit after tax is $177,000,000 in this quarter compared to $181,000,000 in same quarter last year. And operational EBIT margin for the group is 9.1 percent and for the FAF segment, it is 14.4%. If we then take a look at how the operational EBIT has evolved over the past quarters, we see that this year is different from the previous years. So we are significantly lower year to date on our operational EBIT, which amounts to $533,000,000 so far. And this is a clear effect of the COVID situation.
Moving on to the balance sheet. Our balance sheet is still strong. Our intangible assets amount to roughly $4,500,000,000 Our property, plant and equipment amount to slightly less of $4,000,000,000 And our biological assets amount to $2,150,000,000 roughly speaking. A slight increase in inventories during this quarter by $65,000,000 So inventories are now at 640,000,000 dollars Receivables are reduced to $525,000,000 in this quarter. And we have cash and cash equivalents amounting to 446,000,000 dollars Equity is 8,800,000,000 and our equity ratio is unchanged at 68%.
If we then look at the cash flow during this quarter, we have a positive cash flow of €105,000,000 from operations. We have cash flow from investments amounting to minus 176,000,000 dollars I can add to that, that we have also capital commitments in this quarter amounting to DKK 876,000,000 primarily due to our investments in hatcheries both here in the Faroes and also in Scotland and also the new well boat that we commissioned earlier this year. Cash flow from financing was positive with $63,000,000 And when we compare these numbers to especially on the cash flow from financing with the last quarter, it's important to have in mind that we increased our number or we issued new shares last year prior to the acquisition of the Scottish Shaman Company. So that also skews the numbers here. Our net interest bearing debt at the beginning of this quarter was $1,160,000,000 And by the end of this quarter, it slightly increased and now amounts to 1.257 $1,000,000,000 and it's primarily the net investments amounting to $176,000,000 that makes up for the difference.
Financing. By the end of this quarter, we had a net interest bearing debt of these $1,257,000,000 Our bank facilities are still unchanged. So we have a total we had a total of €352,000,000 plus 100 €1,000,000 in financing and also an accordion option of €150,000,000 available if we want to utilize that. Undrawn credit facilities amounted to roughly €2,200,000,000 by the end of this quarter. Then moving on to a short ESG update.
Within our healthy living plan, we have these 5 pillars: our healthy business, our healthy salmon, healthy communities, healthy people and healthy environment. And we have made progress against all of these pillars in this quarter. So we in this quarter, we have signed up for the U. N. Sustainable Ocean Principles, and we have also completed our first CDP submission.
In the healthy community pillar, we have worked with the local community. In the Faroe Islands, it's a small country with only 50,000 people living, but we have our own language. But being a small country with its own language means that educational material can be an issue to have in the local language. So what we have done in this quarter is that we have sponsored the development on of educational material for elementary school about sustainable food systems written in Faroe East. So that we are very pleased to have initiated that piece of work so that the young children in the fair housing also can have material available in Faroes on sustainable food systems.
In our healthy people pillar, of course, COVID-nineteen has been a very significant part of our efforts in this quarter. We have continued with screening for COVID amongst our employees, and we have done around 6,000 tests so far. In addition to that, we have all kinds of other measures in order to protect our employees. And we are very pleased to see that they have been working. Our measures have been successful.
So, so far, since the outbreak of COVID early this year, we only have 5 confirmed cases in the entire group across the Faroe Islands, Scotland, the U. S. And the U. K. And then our healthy salmon.
We have set ourselves an ambitious target to be 100% ASE certified in the Faroe Islands in 2020. And this is something we have made progress against also in this quarter. Actually, we have made really good progress on this point. And last night, we got the very exciting news that our last site in the Faroes has been AC certified, which means now that our all our salmon raised sustainably here in the Faroe Islands is 100% AC certified. This is a result of 7 years of hard work, which Rejian will tell you more about.
Thank you very much, Hakan. And as Hakan said, we are delighted that we have achieved a 100% ASE certification of all bakafrost sites in the Faroe Islands. And 2013, we set these goals. That time, it was very difficult to see how we could achieve it because it's quite ambitious and it's the highest industry standards that we find on summer farming to preserve natural environment, biodiversity, water resources and to provide good working conditions for the employees. So this means that we have to farm our salmon in respect of our environment.
And it has required a lot of changes, a lot of ambitious goals. And most importantly, ambitious and highly committed employees, which have been the key to have this success. If we look at the outlook for the market in general and for Baccafrost, we see that on the supply side, there will be around 5% increase in the supplies in this quarter in Q4 'twenty. But for next year, the supply increase will be 1%, higher in the first half of the year and lower in the second half of the year. And that's very tight.
And I think especially the news yesterday, where it appears that a new vaccine is about to be ready is very good news. And hopefully, that will have a good impact on all our lives and also that we can share good food and we can hopefully get a new normal, which is more easy for everyone. On the farming side, we expect this year to harvest 50,000 tonnes and we expect to reach that and in Scotland 39,000 tonnes. For next year, we increased our harvest in the Faroe Islands to 62,500 tonnes and in Scotland to 44,000 tonnes. And this is mainly based in the Faroe Islands on the largest smalts that we now see the result of, both in the biology but also next year in harvest.
And according to our plan, that development will continue also into 2022 and onwards. In the Faroe Islands, we expect to release around €15,000,000 smalt this year and around €14,500,000 next year. And the development with increase of sizes will also continue. So we expect to reach around €400,000 next year and then €500,000 in the year after. In Scotland, we expect to release NOK10.7 million this year and NOK11 million next year.
Unfortunately, the sizes in Scotland are still small. We are about to start new building programs and that will have a positive impact in our operations, but not in 2021, hopefully slightly by the end of 'twenty two, but more realistically in 2023 and onwards. On the contract side, we have already made contracts for next year. In the Faroe Islands around 33% of expected harvest volumes and in Scotland around 25%. Our strategy is to allocate around 40% of expected harvest volumes at commitments and contracts at any time.
Feed sales are expected to be around 110,000 tonnes this year and slightly up next year, maybe 120,000 tonnes. Fish meal and oil volumes are expected to be lower than this year, also in 'nineteen. So going forward, we have a lot of things in pipeline, investments in the Faroe Islands, as Hakim mentioned with investments in hatcheries. We have just started investment in Northofter and Klibra Del. So those 2 are now in under construction and will start to deliver large or small already in the first half of twenty twenty two.
We are also in Scotland starting about to start a new site construction. So that means that for the next 3 years, we expect to invest quite much. Of course, depending on the development with COVID and earnings, we still have the flexibility to postpone investments if that situation should be realistic. But hopefully, with the new development of the vaccine, we can overcome our plan. And as you know, we will have a Capital Market Day in June 15th June.
So you are mostly welcome to participate there where we can go in more details. Thank you very much. And if there are any questions, feel free to speak out.
It's Alex Storte from DNB. You're right, you have exceptionally high quality of your harvested fish in Q3. Could you go into the reasons why this is exceptionally high? Is it sustainable? Is it from the new smalt, etcetera?
Thank you.
Our superior share of superior is higher than before. So that's the reason why we use that word. We have more higher superior share than we normally have had in the Q3. 3rd quarter are often difficult, but the number of complaints from customers have been down and the number of the share of superior has increased. I guess that the small development has not given full impact yet because last year the average weight of smalt was much lower than this year.
So that development will continue. It's also a matter of which sites you are harvesting from and there are many, it could also be good management from our farmers. Our feed is of course very important, but processing is there are a lot of drivers why quality is slightly down or slightly up. Of course, we hope to learn from what we have done. So there's always a learning process and we hope that this will remain.
Thank you.
Okay. Very good. Karlenby.
Yes. And the next question is from you, Karlen
Can you say something more behind what the reason for the extraordinary high mortality in UK is and how this has developed into Q4?
Yes. Thank you, Karl Mitt. In Scotland, we had some extraordinary mortalities in the Q3. They were mainly driven by in Scotland, the fish is standing very long time in the sea. And when the fish is about 2 years old, they are in general weaker in biology if they have been handled many times.
And in Scotland, they have to treat fish for sea lice from time to time. And when the fish has stayed this long time in the sea and you have some issues, There have been issues with AGD, the gill health of the fish. And then when you have some issues with there was especially in August, there was some heavy rainfalls in some of the locks. And these heavy rainfalls combined with AGD gave a bad circumstance in the pens, which caused high mortality in 3 farming sites. This has this is the driver for the DKK41 1,000,000 loss that we had amounted to around SEK6 per kilo.
And what can you say about the current situation? Has it improved as it normally does in the winter?
These sites were emptied in the Q4 so there will be some impact in the Q4 as well But the loss itself was taken in the quarter, but the higher cost on biomass will somewhat also have some impact on the 4th quarter. Thank you. And Lars,
Konradjonssen, Carnegie. Two questions from me. First, you have a quite high contract share for both Q4 and 2021. Could you share something about discussions with your partners on contracts, how prices have developed? And also the second question goes with regards to Scotland and the depreciation in the quarter.
Is there some changes to the methodology? Or is it just what should we read out of the low depreciation this quarter?
Yes. So on the depreciation side, there are no changes whatsoever in our principles. Can you repeat the first question you had, Lars?
Yes, the first question was regarding contract, both volumes and prices.
Yes, yes. So on the contract side, when there are changes, it's always difficult to look into the future. And especially in the summer market, which is quite volatile. Our strategy is that we want to have around 40% committed to long term customers. So the way we do is normally that we try to do a regular contract sale on forward prices.
Of course at the moment there seems to be a very, very high need for consumer packed goods And that is probably why it has been possible also to make new contracts also despite the difficulties in predicting how the market will flow. Of course, we also see from time to time that we have bigger losses, sometimes we have bigger gains. But it's important for us to have a share of our sale into this segment. And as you know, the prices for next year are slightly down from this year. And then there is also some negative currency on the market.
So that the price in Norwegian kroner and the price in euros are not exactly the same. So that's also that needs also to be taken into account how we do our contracts. But in general, I will say that there is a high demand and high interest for the products. Is that okay, Lars?
Yes. Thank you. So I have a clarification question regarding WAP and FUF where you say that you've had some inventory movements. Does that mean that all else equal, we should see somewhat higher margins for Q4 Q4 when you release the volumes or do I misunderstand you then?
Yeah, Q4 is not finished yet but I guess that you're right in the assumption that as the volumes in our inventories by the end of the quarter are higher than the beginning of the quarter. We saw that there was also a higher value, But actually the cost price is also down on the inventories. So that should have a positive impact.
Thank you.
Martin, Karland.
Yes, thank you. You expect quite strong volume growth at the Faroes for next year. But looking further ahead, it looks like the planned smalt release for 2021 is somewhat lower than what you planned or outlined at the Capital Markets Day last year. But then on the other hand, could the lower number of smolts be fully offset by improved weights on the smolts? Or are you slightly behind on that growth schedule or plan for the ferrods?
Yes. That's a good point. And you have looked quite closely back to our 2019 presentation at the Capital Market Day. And you are right that we are slightly behind the plan that we did in 2018. We are slightly behind because the opening of the Strand facility was delayed.
So we are slightly behind. But when we look at our target for 2023, which was 76,000, I think still I think I still think we can reach that target despite we are slightly behind because as we are increasing our smalt weight up to 400 gram next year, the turnaround or the cycle time will reduce down to 10 to 12 months. So I think we are still good on track to reach the target. And hopefully, hopefully, we also with the new investments in Glyverdell and Nordofter, which are not in those sites we already have the growth capacity up to €200,000 So therefore, these new investments will have a faster impact on the total volume than Strandhead because Strand was a totally new and from 0 from scratch site.
Very good. Thank you.
Anyone else? No? Then thank you very much for your attention this morning.