Pretty sure the population of Westfjords has gone up just by the arriving of the planes today. So, but yeah, I'm very pleased to stand here in front of you all. My name is Hjörtur Methúsalemsson. I can't spell it wrong myself. But, and I'm the Project Manager in Business Development in Arnarlax. And I will have the honor to be leading this event here today. But yeah, we are now live on the stream. I unfortunately can't see them, but I sure hope they see me. So, how this will be set up, we will hold the presentations, and after all presentations, we will have the opportunity to ask some questions.
We will then have a small coffee break around 2:30, and that will be after Westfjords story presentations. And we will continue after that, but we should all be finished before 4:30. But yeah, we are all gathered here together today to go over some details about our company and the salmon farming industry in Iceland, the impact of it, and the future possibilities. So I would like to welcome to the stage the man who will open the first ever Capital Markets Day of Icelandic Salmon, Leif Inge Nordhammer, our Board Chairman of the Board. Please welcome.
Thank you. It's always an honor to be the first one. It's a privilege for me to welcome you all to the Icelandic Salmon Capital Market Days here in Patreksfjörður or in the city of Patreksfjörður. People attending here today are shareholders, Icelandic Salmon, its analysts, its officials, its employees from the company, and also members from the board of Icelandic Salmon. My name is Leif Inge Nordhammer. I have been in the aquaculture business for about 35 years, being the CEO of SalMar for 18 years. I'm a board member in SalMar, and also then, as already mentioned, Chairman, Icelandic Salmon. I'm sure we will have a couple of days with a good, good introduction of the company, Icelandic Salmon, about Iceland as a farming region, and the future outlook for farming in Iceland.
I guess some of you already have been visiting one of our sites, and later today and tomorrow morning, you will visit a sea site of our company. Everything has a beginning, and a new saga started when MMatthías Garðarsso moved back from Norway to Bíldudalur. Mathias was born and grown up in Bíldudalur, and together with his son, Kristján, he founded Arnarlax in 2009, together with some other local people in Bíldudalur. At that time, about 160 people were living in Bíldudalur. Today, it's 280, and mostly thanks to the salmon activity. And I think also this is a good example what this business can mean for remote areas, and we see that everywhere where salmon farming is allowed to develop and grow. It takes time to grow or develop an integrated salmon business.
The picture up to the left is not a floating toilet, but it's an electric power unit installed at Haganes site in 2014. And Arnarlax got its first license in 2012, a 3,000-ton license in Arnarfjörður, at the Haganes site, which you are going to visit later on. They bought a freshwater facility in 2013, Gileyri, which you have seen today, and the first smolts came into the sea spring 2014, at a number of 500,000 fish. And the first harvest from Haganes was in 2016. So we are a very young company. SalMar made the first investment in Arnarlax in 2015 and became a minority owner.
Other milestones through the years are the merger with Fjarðalax in 2016, and also a new license of 10,000 tons the same year. Another 10,700-ton license was issued in 2017, and there was a capital increase in the company of 200 million NOK in 2018. SalMar became the majority shareholder in Arnarlax in 2019. The company was listed on the Euronext Growth Oslo in 2020, and changed name to Icelandic Salmon. Tomorrow, we will ring the bell and mark the listing on the First North Iceland. Aquaculture is becoming a substantial share of the total export of goods from Iceland, and salmon farming has been the main driver behind this.
This year, it might be 6% of the total export of the goods. Half of it take place in Bíldudalur, ladies and gentlemen, a vital population of 280 people. A value creation, I would say, is well above the average. Aquaculture share of the total value for seafood going out from Iceland was around 40%, or an estimated to be a 40% this year, and maybe increase up to 16%-17% next year. Aquaculture on Iceland, I would say, benefits from a strong fishing heritage with highly developed local seafood industry, in particular with regards to seafood processing equipment. We see the potential for growth in the company, and we saw the opportunities on Iceland as a farming region, although there were, there are some few challenges.
Like, for example, temperature, it's very low in the wintertime, very little growth, almost nothing in the coldest months, but we think that also helps for the quality of the salmon. Building a integrated growing company with new people under a new framework, sometimes you are hit by some, mistakes or wrong decisions. We have been through that also, but, where we as a company stand today, in my opinion, I would say so far, we have managed to develop a company with, competent people that understand what farming is about, and with a good management and leadership. We are working continuously with the company culture through the Arnarlax Academy, which many of you know as the SalMar School, and build up good competence in good farming practices and corporate culture is essential for success. We believe we have a good basis for future growth.
As a company, we want to grow. We have owners that want to see that happen, and also owners that will contribute in the growth going forward. But to succeed, we need predictability, a regulatory framework that also take care of the fish welfare and allow Iceland to take out its farming potential. And I would say that it's an obligation to help to feed a growing population in the world with sustainable and healthy food. So let's go to work. Thank you for your attention.
Thank you very much, Leif Inge, for this. Can I hear another round of applause for him? Thank you. But next on stage is here, come to talk about the outlook for the Iceland as a farming region. So let's welcome Kolbeinn Árnason, Director General from the Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Fisheries. Please welcome to stage.
Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. It's a pleasure to be here, to go through this simple presentation of the outlook for Iceland as a farming region. The intention is to go through this in a relatively organized manner. I'll start by introducing a few items that we feel are cross-sectoral through the traditional farming, land-based and offshore. I'll spend the bulk of my time speaking about the thing that's most relevant here, I guess, the traditional farming. Also, the juiciest bite to chew, since there is actually quite a history on that already, and then I'll spend a few words on land-based and offshore. This Capital Markets Day comes at a very interesting time, as with respect to this subject.
Since two years ago, we in the ministry have undergone a policy procedure trying to come up with exactly what I'm supposed to talk to you about here today. And interestingly enough, we have a final draft of that policy that's supposed to be published next week, and we are having a conference of the most relevant stakeholders tomorrow to introduce that. So I'll tiptoe around that a bit without giving you too much information, but you should be aware that this will be published probably around this time next week, so you can dive into the details and see what we are actually thinking. I could tell you everything, but I'd probably have to kill you following that, and I'd rather not. These are the fundamentals for what we've been doing.
We have created a holistic policy called Food Policy for Iceland, where we try to set the stage for the whole industry of food production in Iceland, and set down the basic lines, which are sustainability one, two, and three. We, in the beginning of the work, thought, according to our analysis, that the legal framework, the institutional setup, the surveillance, et cetera, was not up to par, and we had lost the industry along the way and didn't follow the growth of that. So we had the National Audit create a report, which they issued then, this year in January, end of January. While the National Audit looked in the rearview mirror and tried to position ourselves today, we got Boston Consulting Group to analyze for us the future prospects.
In the meantime, little old ourselves spent our time in the ministry trying to analyze more technical details such as, diseases, disease prevention, escapees, possible preventions for that, et cetera, so the technical foundation would also be there when the big strokes had been drawn. As I said, now we're at the moment of introducing this, and I'll give you a small peek into what we're thinking. Boston Consulting drew up this, this picture. The first set of columns is where we were at 2021, as we were shown earlier, and that's a huge growth that has happened in the past 10 years. Boston then says, we have several ways to proceed.
We can grow slowly, and we can reach already issued licenses, which would even only that take us up 100,000 tons, and that's land-based and traditional, and going from an export value of EUR 45-EUR 140. Or we could tenfold what we're doing now if we do things correctly. The premises for each scenario depends on this picture, which I think is quite good from Boston Consulting, and this is focused on what government can do to enable private practice to operate. And that is lay effective governance as a foundation for what comes next, and then creating an environment that allows the private sector to invest and to grow within inside the parameters of sustainable development.
So what we are trying to do with the policy we are publishing next week is to fulfill these two parts the government can do and create a foundation for companies actually to come here, invest, develop, try new technologies, and create an industry that's sustainable. We managed to do that quite well when it comes to fisheries. We've managed this quite well with when it comes to energy. We are a nation of a very few people, under 400,000, very rich of natural resources, so we actually have the unique opportunity to do things correctly, look far ahead, and create an environment that actually works. So if we want to achieve something there, we need to get these things right.... Up until now, the National Audit tells us we haven't.
We have a very fragmented institutional setup, we have unclear regulations and rules, and we need to get our act together if we're going to achieve these things. So, first things first, we need to set up a realistic way forward, and the first thing is to ensure that the baseline is secured. So what we have done is to secure funding for the Marine Research Institute here in Iceland to conduct proper monitoring and proper surveillance of our resources, so that we can know whether we're heading towards a sustainable industry or whether we're heading the wrong way. This is the foundation for growth. This is also the foundation for pulling the handbrake, if that's needed.
So in the next four years, the total number of people focused solely on aquaculture in the Marine Research Institute will go from 8 to 21, and we have a detailed time plan for actions within that. ISK 200 million a year to the Marine Research Institute. This is what they'll be doing: They'll be looking at carrying capacities of fjords, which is basically implementing and researching on the basis of EU Water Directive, and making sure that the water column and the ecosystems of the fjords we're operating in are within limits. They will be reviewing and doing the risk assessment that we know, which is basically preventing wild salmon to be genetically affected.
Monitoring rivers, strengthening the management of wild salmon, and monitoring, actually, sea lice and how they are actually reproducing and distributing here in Iceland, as opposed to other places that we know. So we have a step plan here. We are installing monitors in more rivers than we have now, again, on the basis of trying to hamper the dilution of the wild salmon. And not only have we gotten ISK 200 million for the Marine Research Institute, we've also gotten that number for the Food and Veterinary Agency, which is the body in charge of monitoring and surveilling the operations and issuing licenses.
And there as well, we are increasing the number of people from 8 to 20, and we are setting up a system that is supposed to take care of all aspects of the trade, trying to make sure that not only is the surveillance done correctly, but we smooth out wrinkles that have been apparent in issuing licenses and being reactive to the needs of the companies. So by doing this, I think we are trying to achieve what has been called for, both by the general public, the National Audit, and the companies themselves, to set up a system that works with respect to human resources. Having said that, finding 24 people in Iceland with expert knowledge on aquaculture might be a challenging task. So if you're interested in that sector, I encourage you to apply.
Now, traditional farming, these are the four areas I think you would be most interested in taking a look at on a day like this. Taxes has been a specifically popular topic in our neighboring countries for the past years, and we have adjusted our methodology to some extent from what we have now. We are not going into a complicated system as in Norway. In my dubious past, I actually operated as the CEO of Fisheries Iceland, so I had to deal with a similar system to the aquaculture taxing system from that side of the table, having, in my previous life, actually set it up from the government side. We decided it's too complicated. We're all for simplicity. So what we are doing in changing the tax system is to stretch the possibility to follow the companies.
We will simply follow market prices, and we'll follow the price up. The highest price the Icelandic tax system accounts for now is ISK 800 króna. I guess we're selling at ISK 1,100-1,200 now. Not if I'm correct. So we would be able to get to that point, but also in bad years, we would go down further than we do now. Simple enough, and no major revolutions to what we have. We are also going to calculate this on a monthly basis and apply the tax quarterly. What we are doing in addition is to implement a system of financial incentives to encourage investment in technologies that will aim for sustainability. We are basically setting the policy or building the policy on the pillars of the environment....
So we will incentivize investment that leads to us maintaining what the Water Directive tells us with respect to the water column and the ecosystems. We do not want to affect that. That's marker number one. Number two, animal welfare. So lice and mortality are the two other pillars that we're looking into. We're incentivizing that. Number three, SKPs. So what we will be setting up in the tax system is an incentive plan to encourage investment into these four areas to try to underline the importance of, of, of these factors when it comes to salmon farming. Where there is a carrot, there also needs to be a stick.
So what we are looking at is that we will, in 2028 or by 2028, have evaluated how operations are going, and we will, at that point in time, take further decisions on whether to have a mandatory change of equipment or technique applied to the industry. What we look at now are these factors: large or small, sterile salmon, closed pens. But the worst way to develop new technologies is by government intervening, so we're also leaving open the possibilities for industry or whomever to come up with better ideas than these. So those will be incentivized as well if people can sell us the snake oil they're trying to get us to swallow. So we are encouraging these things to achieve goals, environmental goals, and that's what's driving this policy. If we get those right, we're good.
If we get those wrong, we're not so good. No change in the environmental fund. That's a subtext. We don't need to spend time on that. Only changes distribution of the funds to recipients. The fundamental thing that we think everything here depends on is, however, that we need to be able to incentivize and hit operators individually. We need to be sure that we're not applying collective punishments, but individual punishments, individual rewards, not collective rewards. Area management, firstly, I forgot that one. This is how Iceland looks today. The blue spots marking open sea pens, the light blue spots, closed areas. This is done now through regulation. The suggestion is to put that into legislation, and that is simply to make it more sticky in terms of changing it. You would need to go through Parliament to change that.
But to individual responsibility, we are trying to learn from the mistakes of others. If you go to the Faroe Islands, they had a huge crash in, well, 10 years ago, where you had a number of operators playing parts in all of the areas here in the Faroe Islands. They had multiple bankruptcies, and a huge hit on the Faroese economy. What the Faroese did was simplify the model. There is an individual company responsible for individual areas, and therefore, you don't seek the lowest common denominator when applying technologies to your sites in that area. In a report from the Norwegian National Audit, the same problems are, in fact, in effect in Norway, in areas where you have multiple operators in small areas.
You can take every one of the factors that I had, and you will always have the same area, the one in the red box in Norway, where performance is lower than in all other areas, and the national audit in Norway points to this fact there. What are we doing? We are now making the exact same mistakes as our friends and neighbors in the Faroese and Norway. This is the operations in Westfjords, and each color represents a separate entity. So what we are saying now is that in 2028, there will only be one operator in each of these areas. This will be an area, that will be an area, so on and so forth.
The only area where we will allow more than one operators is up in Ísafjarðardjúp, where you have the mix of colors up there, and that will be two areas. That is to be able to apply individual rewards and punishments. That is to be able to allow more flexibility for the operators within these areas. And I think this is the basis for everything we can do with incentives and actually sticks as well. What we will do until 2028 is to allow the companies to have freedom to negotiate among themselves, and hopefully get to a conclusion on a commercial basis of how to split the spoils between them. And hopefully, 2028 will come in this area, as it will with the implementation of technologies and rules, and it will go as well because industry will have solved this.
We have a set of management measures that are in place now. We have carrying capacity, which is the basically the organic load that can be applied to the seabed. As it is now, it's collective because there is more than one party operating in each area. If we achieve the first thing, it becomes an individual matter, so you can be the master of your own destiny here. The Marine Research Institute will monitor this, and if you do good, if you treat your area well, there is all hope of increase. If this deteriorates, you go the other way. Same applies to risk assessment, but we have a harder issue of getting that into an individual qualification. We have the West Fjords, and we have the East Fjords that have separate separate risk assessments.
These relate to the mix of farmed salmon with wild salmon. But based on performance, this can increase or decrease, and only, what was it, Sirrý? Two days ago, the Marine Research Institute revoked their recommendation for risk assessment for the next three years because of incidents that have happened with respect to escapes, and they are reviewing this on the basis of new information of farmed salmon being caught in salmon rivers. So these are dynamic instruments that actually reflect the performance of industry. In addition to that, we are setting up a traffic light system, which is something that is well known in Norway.
By splitting these areas we have talked about earlier, we believe we can, on an individual basis, set up a traffic light system that includes mortality as an animal welfare indicator, sea lice, which is well known, and then escapees. We have the privilege here in Iceland to be able to DNA analyze all escapees that are found, so we believe we have the equipment to actually react in this manner. So, to summarize, this is what we are trying to go do to keep up our end of the bargain. Now it's up to the industry to live up to its end, and then we hope for a bright future with growth in this part of the industry. But the low case can also be lower if you actually fail to operate in the manner that you need to.
So we're not setting goals of growth or a decrease, we're setting goals of maintaining a sustainable industry, and that's a collective operation that we need to try to join to do well. And 2028 is only five years away, so let's focus. Now, land-based, that is very... a very hot topic now. It's of course, a part of traditional farming in terms of smolts, but it's also a separate industry that's on its way to grow, both here in Iceland, but as well abroad. We have, in our work, come across three major issues, I guess. The licensing system is quite slow. It should be more streamlined than the one we know from traditional farming, since this is a municipality-driven thing that has been done over the years.
In other industries, you have an added layer, which is access to water and electricity, and you have an additional layer, which then comes to us, which is animal welfare and health. So number one, we are in dialogue with other ministries and institutions on trying to streamline the licensing operation. I do hope that we'll see a light at the end of that tunnel soon. We are, as I showed you earlier, trying to strengthen the surveillance operations there with respect to animal health and welfare by setting up a separate unit on that issue, and we are creating a separate set of rules around that issue of animal health and welfare, since there are different parameters in play there than in the open ocean. So hopefully, government can also help here.
With respect to offshore farming, we're only looking as far as 2028. We want to create, and will create a framework whereby individual operators can, in collaboration with the Marine Research Institute, conduct pre-investigations of areas that are of interest. We will set a system up where that can lead to a trial period, technological trial period for a limited number of years, and we will then, in 2028, evaluate how far we will want to go with this and set up a licensing scheme. And I would assume that most of the issues that are in play in traditional farming will be in play there as well. So incentive-driven, industry-driven, within a framework of government approach would be applied.
One thing that needs to be taken into account there, and I encourage people to look at, is that the issues of carrying capacity, which shouldn't be a big one there, but more importantly, risk assessment needs to be taken into place there. We don't know at this point in time how that will affect the potential growth of that industry, but that remains to be seen. So I guess I'll finish in the words of late President Ronald Reagan, with what he considered to be the ten scariest words of the English language: "I'm from the government, I'm here to help.
Thank you very much, Kolbeinn, for this of future outlook for Iceland as a farming region, and there's a lot to think there and a lot to analyze, so yeah, we look into the future, right. Well, next thing is that probably me and many, many others in the room here knows that salmon farming isn't something that is just plug and play. So the next person on the stage will give us an overview of what important- what is important when building an industry. So please welcome Runar Sivertsen, the Chief Strategy Officer from SalMar ASA.
Yeah. Hi, everybody. It's a pleasure for me to be here. As said, my name is Runar Sivertsen. I started in SalMar back in 2010. I've been in the company now for 13 years. Had the pleasure of following a tremendous development we need in the industry, not only in Norway, but also in Scotland and here in Iceland since 2015. And we are really excited of the development so far, and for all the opportunities that are to come. One of the reasons why we are so excited is the fantastic potential on Iceland, and we see a lot of similarities to how we built an industry in Norway. In Iceland, we have favorable biological conditions, with long fjords that create shelter while wind, waves, and currents give the salmon access to oxygen-rich seawater.
We also have a huge coastline that is over 6,500 kilometers. In the Westfjords alone, we have 2,000 kilometers of fjord coastline. If you compare that, as we have been talking about earlier, to the Faroes, they have a coastline of 1,150 kilometers. With that coastline in Faroes, they produced 99,000 tons in 2022, while the total industry of Iceland produced 45,000 tons, less than half of the Faroes. That alone says something about the huge potential we collectively have here on Iceland. And last but not least, we have the coastal culture and people that is used to live off and with the opportunities that the ocean brings.
Something that is crucial when you want to continue to build a sustainable industry, that you have a local community that breathes and also feels that they can be a part and develop this industry, and together with you, create something that you yourself didn't even think possible. If you look at Frøya, for example, where SalMar started back in 1991, there's a population there on 5,400 people. Of that, you have a workforce on 2,300 people, and of those 2,300, 1,800 is now employed in the industry or in connections with the industry. A fantastic history that is just one picture of the many coastal communities along the coast of Norway that has had the same development. But great potential is not enough alone.
What we have learned is, as previous speaker has always also been touching upon, is it has to be on the salmon's terms. We need to find the best sites to ensure optimal currents, to have a good temperature regime, and by that, ensuring optimal farming zones, and meaning that you have as small of a footprint as possible with your production. Not only your production now, but also your ambition for the production going forward. There's a huge untapped potential here on Iceland, both in respect of coastal and offshore farming. The technology and the areas are there. From the government, there is now two things, as we have been touching upon, that regulates the growth.
We have the carrying capacity of 144,500 tons, and we have the risk assessments toward the wild salmon, currently at 106,500 tons. Within this framework alone, we see a huge potential for further sustainable growth within the industry. For Arnarlax, we see a growth potential from 16,000 tons to more than 30,000 tons, 30,000 tons, sorry, within our existing setup and with limited new CapEx usage. In addition, there's a possibility to increase that number even further to 50,000 tons if the regulatory framework is in place, and that also entails new licenses in both Ísafjörður and Arnarfjörður. As the ministry also said now, they are working on a new framework for the industry.
They have done a very thorough job and looked at the regulations, escape assessment, biosecurity, seabeds, and also, as has been mentioned, the regulatory frameworks and conditions in both Norway and in the Far East. In addition, the Boston Consulting Group was hired to see the farming potential on Iceland. Their report underlines overviews of a significant growth potential, and in the base case, they see 146,000 tons from traditional farming in 2032, giving Iceland a potential to be in fourth position in the world, only behind Chile, Norway, and the UK. I should say Norway, Chile, and UK, if you have the production numbers right. In addition, they see a total potential of 245,000 tons if you include offshore and land-based. If something, we feel that 34,000 tons in offshore potential could be somewhat conservative.
It's all about, as I said, developing the technology, developing the industry, and taking step by step. You need to build hatchery capacity, farming capacity, harvesting and processing capacity. You need to have the employees in all of these places to make sure that you have a critical mass of volumes, and that will also open up the potential of offshore farming, offshore farming. In SalMar, we have proven offshore farming through Ocean Farm 1, which is now in the third production cycle, and with that, we have great biological results. Of course, it's huge investments. Ocean Farm 1 is $1.5 billion alone. In addition, you would need smolt capacity and harvest capacity, but those investments also signifies something more than just investments. It's also opened up brand new areas, brand new areas to farming, which isn't available for us at the moment.
So the investments need to come, but the potential is also very, very large. But doing things on the salmon's terms and investing in a strong, robust value chain is not enough alone. We also need to invest in the people and in the local communities. They are the heart and the backbone of driving the industry forward. A great workplace with a sustainable industry also demand that we invest in local communities so that there are good and meaningful activities, not only via work, but also for you and the rest of your family, the rest of the day. To give something back and ensuring viable and vital coastal communities, not only on the fjords of the north coast of Norway, but also on Iceland, is an important part of the social contract and building our industry here in the Westfjords and on Iceland.
So, to summarize. To summarize the key factors, we have the biological conditions, we have the people, and with the regulatory framework that enables further sustainable growth, we will have the farming volumes needed for a further strong development of the Icelandic salmon industry. There's a massive potential in front of us, and Arnarlax on Iceland is, is uniquely positioned to take it, and the first threshold should be to reach that 146,000-ton mark, as previously mentioned. Because with bigger production comes more Icelandic volume into the market every day. In addition to more volumes, it dictates more sustainable investments through the entire value chain.
If we are to grow, we need to increase our smolt capacity, we need to increase our harvesting and processing capacity, and we also need to ensure sustainable transportation routes from Iceland and into the market. And these investments, again, will open for a big number of new jobs, seeing that value-added production, if you take into account numbers from Norway, generates 3-4 times higher employment rate than pure farming and harvesting operations. So for us, when we see more volume, we see the same growth and journey that we have had in Norway. We have seen what that has brought, which now is salmon farming is the second largest export industry in Norway. And of course, we feel that the potential here in Iceland is also really, really high.
Another important fact is that with more value-added production here on Iceland, we also see access to major retail contracts, and with that, the opportunity to compete in global markets. That will also unlock more regular shipments, both air and by boat, and by that, also unlocking the potential of creating and even further developing a premium brand, both for the Icelandic salmon, but hopefully also for Iceland. A win-win opportunity where we see the export of salmon can contribute and promote Iceland while reinforcing the unique Icelandic qualities of the salmon. In addition, increased volumes, increased investments, increased jobs creating, growth in the local communities, and even stronger position for the Icelandic salmon, creates the need of industry locomotives. And SalMar is very committed to aid Arnarlax into further strengthen its position as such a locomotive.
As we have seen in Norway, industry locomotives operating across the value chain will enable and open the door to smaller players, and take down the overall barrier of entry to the industry. Newcomers can focus on any step of the value chain and sell services to each other and to the industry locomotives, creating vast ripple effects, not only within the industry, but in the local communities and in the country as a whole. So to summarize, in Norway, we have built a fantastic, fantastic sustainable industry over 50 years. The main development over the last 30 years, the export value for Norwegian salmon was NOK 5 billion in 1990. In 2022, the same number was NOK 106 billion. This was made possible by biological conditions, sustainable farming, huge investment, and a regulatory framework that has seen the potential and enabled growth.
It has been an incredible journey in Norway, and we strongly feel that Iceland has embarked on this journey, and their continued success will come. There's a growth potential, as we have talked about, within the Icelandic industry, that will enable critical mass of volume, creating more investments in the total value chain, more value-added production, and a stronger Icelandic brand. Again, seen from Norway, we are very confident that this will create more jobs, more people in smaller communities, and a vast amount of ripple effect across the industry, the local communities, the university on R&D sector, and in the country as a whole, as we have seen in Norway. There is oceans of opportunity out there, and we feel that we are only in the beginning. So it's very, very hard not to be very, very excited about this opportunity.
We feel that Arnarlax is in pole position to take part of this journey, and we really much are looking forward to the road ahead. Thank you so much for your attention.
Thank you for this insight, Runar. It's definitely not enough to just have salmon, water, and feed. You have to have a lot more than that. It's very good, very good overview. During the next presentation, we will have two strong speakers from Vestfjarðastofa. They have a very strong connections to the Westfjords, and they have done a very important job in building this industry, like helping this industry develop in these rural areas. So I would pleased to welcome Guðrún Anna Finnbogadóttir and Sigríður Ó. Kristjánsdóttir.
Mm-hmm. Yes. Hello, my name is Guðrún Anna Finnbogadóttir, and I'm the team leader of Westfjords Regional Development Office, and I'm placed here in Patreksfjörður. We are the economic development agency for the Westfjords region of Iceland. We work closely with municipalities, research institutes, universities, companies, and entrepreneurs in its various projects, with focus on knowledge and data, counseling, marketing, environment, and culture. The growth in salmon farming in Westfjords is remarkable, from almost nothing in 2010 to currently around 30,000 tons. During that period, a lot of changes have taken place, and we have been working enthusiastically to motivate the government to follow up with legislation, infrastructure, monitoring, and control in Westfjords. There are adjustments needed in a rural society like Westfjords, with a new, fast-growing international business in our blue fields, the fjords. The histogram shows the percentage of the total export value in Iceland.
The fish industry is currently around 12%, but when we compare it with fish farming, the last 4 years, 2023 is only the first 8 months, fish farming has become almost 5% of total export value. It's. We should mention that salmon export has become bigger than export of bacalao here in Iceland. The histogram shows the payslips to employees in the fish farming in Westfjords, and the graph shows the total salary. The green line shows the salary in the southern part of Westfjords, the yellow of the north area around Ísafjörður, and then blue in the east part of Westfjords. The salary in the southern Westfjords was around ISK 1,200 million in 2021, and has been growing since. But growth can be seen in the northern part, where the salmon sea farms are starting now as well.
Here we can see Westfjords' population change in the south and east 2001 to 2022, and also estimated development. Here in Patreksfjörður, Bíldudalur and Tálknafjörður, it's the blue line. The development of decreasing population changed in 2013, when the salmon sea farm started, and the forecast shows growth until 2030. Strandir, the eastern part of Westfjords, had similar population, but no new business, and a decrease is clear since 2001. Drastic changes are needed to alter the situation there. Now, to the local area of Arnarlax. Logi was established in 1955 in Patreksfjörður, so it has been running for 68 years. The company works in engine repairs as well as all kind of maintenance, mainly for the fish industry.
The business is still going strong, but now around 25% of the business is directly related to fish farming industry, but also a number of indirect projects connected to the fish farming. In 2022, it was almost 2 positions working directly for the fish farming industry, but I should mention they were 8 last year, and 1 of them left to Arnarlax. Yeah. Logi is a fine example of a company that is holding its position in business, along with the growth in the fish farming industry. Sjótækni has focus on contracts on sea and by the coastline all around the country, starting from 2014, servicing aquaculture industry in Westfjords. The service has been increasing, along with more growth in production capacity for aquaculture in Westfjords, with approximately 40 employees.
They still focus on services, diversified projects to even out seasonal highs and lows in the aquaculture sector. They are holding the environmental system certification, ISO 14001, as well as ISO 45001. For a fully grown company like Arnarlax, there are expectations towards the company from society. The people seek stability, a good image, and safe business operating in the best possible manner according to society and the environment. It is crucial for the local societies that the whole operation takes place in the area. We must build up harvesting plants, education, research, monitoring, control, and other services. Sustainable business encompasses all elements. The future of the company and the people in Westfjords are entwined. In recent years, the aquaculture industry in Iceland has grown tremendously.
A further increase in growth is anticipated as a result of rising global population, growing environmental consciousness, and desire for product traceability. It is crucial for the industry to have skilled and knowledgeable labor if it is to meet these expectations. To some extent, educational institutions in Iceland have not been able to follow the rapid growth, which has led to a lack of education and training for aquaculture employees. Furthermore, the number of jobs in research, innovation, and monitoring has not risen in step with the expansion of the sector.
Last year, we have been working with the Long Life Learning Center in Ísafjörður, we meaning Vestfjarðastofa, and the result of that work is that in January 2023, Arnarlax, Arctic Fish, and Háafell made a contract with the junior college in Ísafjörður, supporting the college to launch a new study program with the name, The Sea, Environment, and Resources. The Ísafjörður Junior College will launch this program in cooperation with the junior college in Snæfellsnes, which is placed here in Patreksfjörður as well, Sauðárkrókur, Neskaupstaður, and Vestmannaeyjar. So it's all around Iceland, aiming to spark interest with students 16-19 years old. On our travel visiting educational institutions in Iceland and Norway, I should mention that one name came up everywhere, and that was, Björn Hembre. He had been there as well, just last week or coming next week.
One of the results of our analysis show that there is a need for a development of blue competence center, like in Norway, and the next logical step will be for us to take on the task of developing a collaboration platform for aquaculture industry players. The following steps involve assembling stakeholders and determining how to finance the creation of a blue competence center. We are now working on establishing a research center in one of Patreksfjörður heritage building, Vatneyrarbúð. That's the big one here. The aim is to acquire knowledge and create a platform for cooperation between stakeholders involved, and we are seeking further support from official parties. Westfjords Development Office and the municipalities, Vesturbyggð and Tálknafjarðarhreppur, have visited affiliated institutions, and the plan is to open the Vatneyrarbúð Center early next year.
All partners agree that it's important to build up aquaculture science society in Westfjords. But the flow of money is a bit slower than the flow of our mind. In 2020 and 2022, the Westfjords Development Office conducted a survey asking everyone older than 18, 18 years old, living in Westfjords about their opinion on the aquaculture industry in Westfjords. I would like to stress that the answer came from the people living next to the industry. One of the question was, "Fish farming creates valuable income for municipalities." And you can see on the histogram that in 2020, 80% said they rather agreed or agreed that the fish farming was creating valuable income for the municipality. However, in 2022, only 68% believed so.
The statement, "Fish farming requires technical and higher education with good salaries in the local area of the fish farming," here in 2020, 75% rather agree or agree, and in 2022, the number is 67%. This new industry has developed new jobs for those with technical and higher education in the companies, but now we must focus on further development in the research industry in Westfjords as well. When developing a new industry, it is crucial to have support from the local people, and from the previous tales, we don't have to worry, I can say. One of the main questions was, "Looking at the whole industry in Westfjords, how positive or negative are you towards fish farming?" The result in 2020 was that 81% of those answering was rather or very positive, but in 2022, it was 67%.
This decrease is something we must, must consider, but take note and remember that 67% support is a high number. I believe we can do this together, creating a synergy that benefits us all, the company, as well as the society. Now, I would like to welcome General Director of Vestfjarðastofa, Sigríður Ó. Kristjánsdóttir.
Hello, everyone. I have a very much hate connection with those things—so I'm just gonna stand here. As Guðrún Anna said, we at the Westfjords Regional Development Office, Vestfjarðastofa, we have a purpose in this society. We are the Association of Municipalities, but we also work with companies in the region, and we advocate the interest of the Westfjords of Iceland through administration, through marketing, coordination, cooperation, and dialogue. That's our—That's one of the main things that we, we are doing, and we have had great dialogue with, with this, with the fish farming industry. But what we are working towards, and what has been, been a really big part of our purpose through the years, and, the municipality, the Association of Municipalities, has been around since 1959.
And their main focus in 1959 was better roads, better phone connections, and better electricity system. We're still working on that. But in recent years, we have made great strides because our main focus is now, and has been for several years, on competitiveness. The competitiveness of this region as a region to live in, as a region to invest in, and as a region to visit. These are all interconnected, but they all rest largely on infrastructure. You need to be able to get here, you need to be able to travel here, and you need to be able to transport whether it is your goods going away or what you need to create your goods. That's basic. But this has been slow.
It's been a little bit faster in the, in recent years, and we are looking towards not having unpaved roads on our main system. And I shouldn't be saying that in 2023, but I am, and this is shocking, and it's also shocking how slowly... I'm sorry, Kolbeinn, this is not your personal fault, but how slowly the national government has been responding to our wishes the people of the Westfjords, because we're working for them, regarding the framework for this great, big industry that is greatly impacting our future possibilities. We have, from the year 2008, the Association of Municipalities in Iceland has been calling towards the Icelandic government to create a proper framework for this industry. They are hearing us maybe now, but I...
This is, this is perhaps the first time, the last few years is the first time we actually believed that somebody is listening. And it is shocking that it takes 15 years to respond, for Reykjavík to actually discover that the aquaculture industry has started in the Westfjords. But maybe it's the roads. But we are focused on these four growth sectors. This is not the only industries in the Westfjords, but these are the growth sectors that we have talked about: it's seafood, it's aquaculture, it's tourism, and it's energy. What is needed for these growth sectors to work, and what we need for innovation, for knowledge building, and for the development of the region, are those five things up there. This is from Iceland's innovation policy, but it's really relevant here.
We need the right mindset inside of the Westfjords and outside, towards, not the least, this industry. That's been a struggle for the last few years, hasn't it, all of you? Capital and market access is something that really isn't maybe in our power to work with, but we've been working on the framework, that businesses can grow here, that people here can live here, and that human resource part is the education, where Guðrún Anna has been working very much with the companies here and with the school system, and to build up. Because we are working with a regional plan of action, and this is the vision for 2030. Because we need... This is part of a regional plan of action that's made for a five-year period.
We're entering this last year, next year, where we will start working on our next plan, and we, of course, will contact all the companies and, and municipalities in order to do that. But we have been working, the last five years, we've been working really hard on infrastructure and on job creation, and as we have for the last years before that. But now we need to look at housing, which is needed for further growth, and we need to look at the education, at the welfare, and not the least, culture. And I was really glad when Rúnar talked about it needs to be fun. It needs to be fun to live here. The society needs to grow as well.
And I welcome Arnarlax, and I, I congratulate you on this part, where you're fully grown now on the Icelandic market, and I really welcome Arnarlax, and, and thank you for the cooperation so far, and, we of course are looking forward to cooperation from now on. And I thank you.
Thank you very much, Guðrún and Sirrý, for showing us how salmon farming has impacted the region, and as we see, we have a lot to go further. Yeah, future is close. Let's, now, the plan is to have a coffee break. We will have it, yeah, a short coffee break. I expect everyone to be back in their seats quarter past 3, so it's almost 20 minutes. Okay, the toilets are in the left to right. There is coffee in right and left, so yeah, enjoy. Yes, hello. We almost made it. Please welcome everyone once getting back to their seats, and hope you have enjoyed this break, of this home-baked cake and flatbrød, which is, flatkøkur, which is kind of the Icelandic knäckebröd go-to. It's...
But yeah, let's everyone sit down, and then we will continue. We have only one presenter left. That presenter will go into details on what Arnarlax is doing and how the outlook is for the coming years. If he would be in Denmark, he would be known as Bamse, but here in Iceland, we know him as Björn Hembre, our CEO. Please welcome him to the stage.
Thank you, Hjörtur. So, ladies and gentlemen, good to see you all here on the first capital market day of Icelandic Salmon. My name is Björn Hembre, as was said. I have had the privilege and the pleasure of being the CEO of Arnarlax for close to five years now. It has been an exciting. My formal background is I'm a biologist, and I've been working in the salmon industry since 1997. And most of those years, I actually been working in Salmar in Norway. And the development that we have seen over the last year have been very positive overall. There has been bumps in the roads.
There has been things that we have to take care of and improve, but all in all, we are going in the right direction. I just want to show a video of presenting our company at the beginning here. Nei.
Down, down.
Down, down.
Iceland, encircled by the cold North Atlantic. Sustainability has been a way of life here for generations. It's deeply rooted in the way we relate to the world around us. It's in the powerful streams flowing in from the North Atlantic that cause our fish to develop exceptional stamina and fitness in spacious waters. It's in the innovative minds of our scientists working together on new methods for greener aquaculture. It's in the challenging Icelandic weather, blowing in off the glaciers and mountains, shaping us into resourceful and resilient people. It's in the family bonds we hold so close, whether it's across the mountains or across the table. It's in the cold ocean currents that replenish our sheltered fjords and the fresh water currents that generate our renewable energy.
It's in the high standards we set for ourselves to raise healthy salmon for consumers worldwide, who choose the best taste and texture on the market and insist on a product created in the most responsible way possible. It's in our commitment to work alongside nature in creating not only an excellent source of nutrition with exceptional flavor, but also a product that is good for the planet today, tomorrow, and for generations to come. It's in our heritage as it shapes the way we approach every day, every decision, every interaction. Sustainability, it's in our nature.
So, from the company today, of course you have seen Leif Inge and Runar on the stage, and I am here now. Many of you will meet Kjartan later today in the bus and on the sea. And we have more of our team here. So, Jónas is here, our CFO. Rolf Ørjan is here for questions as well, our COO for biology. Sindri, our assistant CSO, is here for questions. Silja, our Quality Manager, is here. Hjörtur, you have met. And Jonny is here, and those who are a part of the official program will meet him in Gilteyri if you haven't done that. And we also have two more board members here.
Gustav Witzøe is here, and Esben Markussen is here to take part in this Capital Markets Day. When we start to plan this day, we were thinking, "Okay, that would be good to do it. We will... Yeah, we will probably someone that is interested." We were talking maybe 10, 15 people, at least. We'll try to sum up, sum up the people we knew and trusted. But thank you all for being here. It's amazing. So Icelandic Salmon is the listed company on Euronext Growth, and Arnarlax is the operational company on Iceland. I will tell you more about the operations we have during the presentation in freshwater, seawater, harvesting, and sales.
The management group in Arnarlax is a mixed group, and it comes to both gender, age, and origin, and it's a group that fills out very good. I'm very proud of both the management group, but also the team that we have built in the company over the last years. There's a lot of competence that... And that takes time to get the right competence in the right position, but we are in a very good position now. I wouldn't not dwell long with the timeline, but it has been very important for the company, the entrance of SalMar. Because then you have access to competence, you get the credibility from all stakeholders, not to mention banks, and has been very crucial for the development of the company.
Leif Inge told the line of the development, but I want to emphasize on how critical this has been for making Arnarlax what it is today. What we is today is a company that have had steady growth over the last years. Someone have of course hoped for maybe even steeper growth, but this is the development we have had, and we see also that we have had a positive development when it comes to EBIT margin for the company. There are pros and cons by being on operating in the Westfjords of Iceland. We have pros like we have very low lice levels on the fish, do not spend much money on delicing. We have less growth on the nets.
We have low logistic cost to United States through the boat transport from Reykjavík. We have a very stable energy cost. We have the benefit of having geothermal heat for our smolt production, and so far we also have had licenses for free. There is a lot of investments done to operate the licenses, but the licenses itself has been free. Then there are some cons as well with logistic cost when it comes to feed, for example. Today, we haven't reached a critical mass for the industry to have a feed mill on Iceland, so we need to import the feed, so that generates extra logistic cost. We also, compared to Norway and UK, have a extra logistic cost when it comes to transport to the European market.
The European market is our biggest market, and to use boat from Iceland is more expensive than a truck from Norway or UK. Other cons that affects our cost is that we have a shorter output window for smolts. So due to the temperatures in sea, we start output of smolt around mid or late May and end early September. And that is something that affects the utilization of our smolt plants. So yeah, and it's as I said, big investments done, and it's important for the industry to have a framework that makes us able to compete in the international market. This is the places we are operating on Iceland.
So we have most of the activity in the Westfjords, with one smolt plant and all our sites in sea, and we have our harvest plant here and significant part of our administration, and we also have two applications for licenses. So that we are waiting for a decision, one in Ísafjörður and one in Ísafjörður. And then you look at the south part of the map, you see two, the two dots further south there is our smolt activity, and then we have our sales office in Reykjavík together with the with finance and business development. Then we dig into the production that we are doing. So the biology, which means freshwater and seawater operations, are managed by Rolf Ørjan.
Then Johnny has responsibility for the freshwater and Waldemar for the seawater operation, with the support from Silja on quality. For freshwater, we have three facilities in operation today. We have Gilteyri here in Tálknafjörður, our neighbor fjord, and two facilities on the south coast, Ístor and Laxabrót. We have the capacity to produce around 7-8 million smolts, and we have licenses for 3,000 tons of maximum allowed biomass on land. And this gives us or the production we have today is sufficient to fill up the existing licenses we have in sea. And our smolt strategy is not very complicated, because we have focus on implementing best practice. We know how to produce a smolt.
It's just to do all the small, right details on every single place in the production. And that's been a long process, and we see the results of that now. And that, when we do that, we get good quality on the smolt, which has been a very important goal. And also increase in smolt weight has been very important for us, and of course, to have sufficient number of smolts. So if we look at the big picture, we have the three kind of units with Ístor, which has a capacity of 45 million smolts today, depending on size, but we see a potential there of 10. Gilteyri, we have a capacity of 2 million, and we see the potential there for 2, but maybe we could increase the size.
For Fjarðalax and Laxabrót 5, they are seen together because in Fjarðalax we produce the smolt, then we transport it to Laxabrót 5 and put it on seawater for post-smolt production. Today, we have about 1 million smolt capacity, but we see the potential for an increase to 5 million post-smolts there. In total, we have, within range, a capacity of 17 million smolt, but today we have 7-8 million smolt, and that is sufficient for the licenses we have today. If we look at the, Istor and Laxabrót 5 are two plants very close to each other.
They're actually so close that we now put up a pipe or more pipes, but there's pipes for transporting fish back and forth, and also possibility to utilize the water resources on the two places between the sites. And this means also that we concentrate a lot of our smolt activity in that area, and the reason, main reason for that is to concentrate the competence, build a competence center for smolt production there, because it is maybe one of the most competence demanding part of our value chain. So to build a robust structure around the organization for freshwater in that area is important for us. So just to show the potential we have, so this is Ístor, where we have a license of 1,800 tons, so maximum allowed biomass.
We have around 24,000 square meters of land available that we own. So it's. And we can utilize that land on the license we have and change the production up to 10 million post-smolts. The benefits on the south coast of Iceland is the access to 8-degree seawater, and it's almost an unlimited access, you, from the ground of 8 degrees seawater. So the Ístor has a huge potential for post-smolt production. If you look at Gilteyri in Tálknafjörður, we there have an application for 1,000 tons of maximum allowed biomass. The thinking behind that is that we see the potential for producing the 2 million smolt we produce there today at 120 grams, maybe take them up to 500-700 grams.
That will be not a post-smolt production, but it will be a freshwater production of big fish on a RAS system. But we do do this application since we have the land, and we want to have the opportunity to do it. There's no decision made, but we have the opportunity because we are strong believers in this industry, and we need to have a plan for future growth. And then we have Fjarðalax, which is a smolt plant with its limitations. It was built actually in the mid-1980s for where the business idea was to produce smolts for export to Norway. And it's actually a bit strange because it's a smolt plant, and I think it's about one hour drive to a harbor.
But we did, we bought Fjarðalax three years ago because we saw this was an low-hanging fruit for access to more smolts. Not a big investment. This was a state-of-the-art smolt plant in 1985, and we did some modification, and we produce a premium quality smolt on the fields 10 kilometers from a harbor. But it works fine. And the final one is Laxabrót 5, where we have today a license of 900 tons. We have 21,000 square meter available area, and we have good access to water, both fresh and saltwater. So in combination with the Fjarðalax, it could give us 1 million big smolts, but we see a potential here as well to produce about 5 million post-smolts.
So what I'm actually trying to say is that we are, we are prepared to push the button when we see that the, the potential for growth is coming. If you look at the seawater operation, which is in the fjords, we have around us here, where we have 23,700 tons of Maximum Allowed Biomass. We are in a position now where we have 8 sites approved for production. We have 2 in application process, so we expect to have 10 sites quite soon. And we have split that up in 5 generation zones as it is today. So that is separated due to biosecurity reasons. And all the production we do in sea is ASC certified.
I hope we get the opportunity to take most of you through our feeding center, the operation center, as we call it, where we feed all the fish. So, that is a room where they have access to screens and cameras in every cage, and feed all the cages that we have. At the moment, that is approximately 65, Rolf? Yeah, 65 cages in sea that are fed individually throughout each and every day. So on a good day in the feeding center, they could distribute out in the cages around between 150 and 170 tons of feed, which means we produce around 140 to 150 tons of salmon every day. On a good day.
We have said that we have been steadily improving on seawater as well, and the kind of changes we have done over the last years, it's first of all the reduced density in the cages during wintertime. Never go above 13 kilo per cubic meter. We learned that lesson in February 2020, and it was learned forever, so to speak, that so density has been a big improvement, smolt quality has been a big improvement, and the size of the smolts has been a big improvement.
We did a big step this year when we increased the average smolt weight from around 150 to 220 grams, and we were able to put a significant amount of fish above 700 grams into sea early in the season, which will give us harvest volume right after summer next year. Then there are strategic things we have done as well, and one of the main, my main focus has been building competence. It is the key to success. You have to know what you are doing. That has been done through like formal education, but of course, also in daily work in the operations that we are doing. Then we have put out more smolts on the sites.
We see that the sites we have are very good. They have a good carrying capacity, and we utilize that opportunity to increase the number of fish on the good sites. Separate generations in sea I talked about, and that we exclude the smaller sites is then a consequence of utilizing the bigger sites better, and we have increased the harvest capacity. When I came in in 2019, January 2019, we had a capacity of 50-60 tons a day in the harvest plant. Today, we can, on two shifts, take 150 tons through the harvest plant. And then it's adaption of equipment to make sure that we have the right equipment on the right sites. On seawater, we are in process to get bigger sites. So this is applications we have in.
You see the original sites, and the green is the new applications. And this is also a preparation, mostly for future growth. We do this, so we have the opportunity to put more cages on the sites that has the carrying capacity to take the fish. We don't have any interest of overloading the sites, because then we just are shifing in our own nest. But we see that the capacity on the sites are very good, because we monitor that every time when we have maximum bio-mass on the site, and we monitor the bottom, the sea bed, after we have had the resting period, and we have always had best condition after resting period before we start production again. And how is a typical site at sea in the Westfjords?
We see that the good sites can have a biomass that is above 7,000 ton. We don't know where the limit is upwards, because we haven't very often been above 7,000 ton. But we see that for most of the sites, 7,000 ton plus is no problem. And then we have an optimal temperature during summer, 11, 12 degrees. Fish grows quite good. Not much biological issues throughout the summer. We need to delice maybe once or twice, and then we have low winter temperatures, as was mentioned. And that has been an important part of the learning curve, to deal with the low winter temperatures. But now we have a protocol for how we do it. We don't do any delicing just before winter.
We do that in good time, before winter, so the fish is, don't have any damages at all. We have the low density, and we have fish of good quality. And also then, that the extended harvest capacity means that we can take out a cage in a week if we see that something comes up, to save values and take care of the fish welfare. And the rows you see here is the current picture, the net movement of water. This is on Ladsbotn in Arnarfjörður, and you see there is a total net movement of water in one direction, which of course, is very important. I need to speed up, sorry.
Good. I was close.
Yeah.
I was close.
One thing I forgot to mention, and Leif Inge touched into it, and that is the low temperatures, the slow growth that makes a difference when it comes to quality of the muscle of the fish. And the explanation for that is that when a fish grows slow, it develops more muscle fibers. So the muscle fiber density in the muscle itself gets more dense, and there is a strong correlation between high muscle fiber density and texture of the fish, and also color of the fish. Very well documented. And that, so we need to use these low temperatures to our benefit when we come to the market, because there is a huge potential, and we have heard many, many times, "This is the best salmon we ever tasted." And I don't think they say that to everyone.
Our harvesting is in Bíldudalur. We have a capacity there of 30,000 tons, theoretically, in a year. We have that BRCGS certified to prove our food safety. And we use super chill on our chilling tanks to take the temperature down to minus one degree, to extend the shelf life of the fish. And that is beneficial because we have a little longer time into the European market, and we have when we send with the boat to America, it's 3-4 days more. So it's beneficial to have an extended shelf life. And since we cannot take all of you into the harvest plant, we have just made a short video to take you through the process in the harvest plant we have today.
It's not the biggest harvest plant in the world. It's not the most impressive harvest plant in the world, but it's probably the most effective harvest plant per square meter in the world. So hopefully, next time when we have a capital market day, we have a new harvest plant and a visitor corridor, and we can take everyone in, but we have to deal with this today. ... So that is how the harvest plant works. We are, of course, also have plans for the future for harvesting. Today, we are in a position where we have sufficient capacity in our harvest plant in Bíldudalur, and that could take care of the expected growth that we see within existing licenses up to 26,000 ton.
But we have a good, good dialogue with the the municipality here, Vesturbyggð, about a plot here in Patreksfjörður, where we have space enough to build a new harvest plant. We have the drawings ready. We know what we want, what we need, but we, of course, need volume to take through this harvest plant, which is, of course, a significant CapEx investment of probably around EUR 60 million. So, that is, it's a work in progress, but there as well, when we see that the potential for growth is there, we are ready to push the button. Sales and logistics. So, that is located in, in...
The sales team is located in Reykjavík, and we do sell all our fish ourselves, try to reach out as close to the end consumer as possible, and avoid traders as much as possible. Also, our strategy has been to work close with premium customers. Customers who see the quality of the fish, who see the origin, the Icelandic origin. Icelandic seafood has a tremendous reputation in the market, and so has the Icelandic salmon, and also see our certifications. It's a long job. It's not just to put up an advertisement in an American paper and think you will sell premium salmon. You need to build relations, and you need to work hard towards those customers.
But that is the kind of sales scope we have for our product. It's quality, it's the sustainability in our production, and it's the origin of the fish. And we have also started to produce fillets together with a local partner here in Patreksfjörður, Oddi. So there is picking up a quite significant volume of pre-rigor fillet production. We like to see that grow even more, so that is something we are working on. Because more fillets gives us access to new markets, new customers, and also lower our logistic cost. We sell about 76% of our volume to the European market, 22% to the American market, and 2% to China. China is an interesting market in the Far East for us since we have a free trade agreement.
Iceland have a free trade agreement with China, so which gives us a 10% benefit compared to most other countries. Our sales team is, Kjersti is the CSO. Sindri, who is here, is our assistant CSO, and he leads the daily operation in the sales office with the sales team and the logistic and back office team. Silja is, of course, supporting the team there as well with the quality work. We are very strong believers in that there is a good future for Icelandic salmon in the market. We know that the growth in production is lower than the growth in demand, so that gap will increase in the years to come because there is no signs that there will be a huge jump in any parts of the world where salmon is produced.
We know that Norway will steadily be somewhere around or not above 3%, at least. And then we don't see any other nations either who will give a significant growth. And then, of course, land-based come, but it doesn't represent any volume in any way. And also ocean farming is coming, but at the moment, it doesn't represent anything significant in the total picture. So the market itself looks great, and to if you look at the Icelandic part, when we have excluded Norway and Chile, is small. So for us to be there with a special product, with good quality and a price premium should be very, very possible. This is a summary of the logistic out of Iceland.
I will not spend much time on this slide, but my point here is actually when I came in 2019, the first possible way to get fish out of Iceland without flying it was on a Wednesday. Then we had a vessel in Bíldudalur who could go to Europe. And today we have vessels Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday to Europe. We have boat every Tuesday to the American market, and we have boat on Wednesdays to UK. So it has changed a lot, and that has also changed the image of the product that we are in the market almost every day of the week. And of course, we have regular flights out in the world from Keflavik. And this is a reason why we focus strongly on the American market.
The American market needs to import around 500,000 tons of salmon every year. Most of that is entered in with plane, and we have the opportunity to use a boat with a significant lower carbon footprint, reduced with 95% compared to air freight, and also a positive effect of the cost. And we have been doing this now for over 2 years, and the customers are very happy with the product they get. So we see this as a huge opportunity to get even more fish into the American market. Europe will always be the most important market, since they are the strongest and biggest market for fish between 3-5 kilos, and then the American market is more fish.
They want 6+, but when they can't get 6+, they buy fish that is 5-6 kilo as well. So, so that is an important part of our strategy. This is, some pictures from a cooperation with the, with customers, where we have developed a brand together with the customer. We have Icefjord in, in Los Angeles. We have Snøe in, in France. We have, also launched Icefjord in, in Japan, and we, we see our product at the fancy restaurants and supermarkets where it enters the, the market. So that is very satisfying, very motivating because they do this before, because it's the best quality they can get. So what do we do for, sustainability? We are strong believers in that it's possible to do salmon production in a, sustainable way.
We use, of course, ASC certification as a documentation of what we are doing, not only for sustainability, but also how we treat our people and the community around us. We are entering into a loan agreement that is a sustainability-linked loan. We issue the yearly sustainability report because we think transparency is important to show what we are doing. We use the vessel to the American market. We have, this year, two new barges that have hybrid technology to reduce the fuel consumption. We have the new hybrid service boat that came in now. We also have a program to electrify all the barges on sea over the coming years.
Of course, when we are in Iceland, we have to use green energy, so we do that. The geothermal energy we use for heating up the water in the smolt station. We monitor the carrying capacity on our sites, so we make sure that they have fully recovered before we start producing on them again. Then I talked a bit about the competence earlier, and people is, of course, our most important assets, and we spend one week a year to have Arnarlax Academy with all employees. Then we spend extra time with all our leaders to develop them as leaders as well, to be able to operate the company in a good way.
And we have been focusing a lot to have employees into vocational training, like Fagbrev in in Norwegian, to, to increase the competence in the company. And we also take trainees into the company, have done that over the last years, and has been a success. Some of them stay and adapt and get a job, and some end up elsewhere in the industry, either it's with education or other companies. And we also have, I think at the moment, four employees that are working on a, on a higher degree in university, combined with their job in in Arnarlax. So we try to support and make it possible for people to develop further. And our people should never be, should never be unclear to them what is the top priority.
This is something we repeat at all occasions we meet, and that is, first of all, everyone should be safely home. The next priority is to keep the salmon in the tanks and the cages. The third is to provide good welfare, and when we have control of these three things, we can start to produce. If you are not 100% sure that you have followed your internal control, that you have checked everything that should be checked when it comes to escape, you cannot do anything else. And I think that we have been able to keep a good focus on this. And it's the foundation to have a sustainable production, as Kolbeinn is talking about earlier. This has been shown earlier today, and this has been shown earlier today, so I don't spend time on that.
The Boston Consulting work was mentioned earlier as well, so I will not stop with that. But of course, now I have been talking about our approach towards traditional cage farming. But it's also a part of the strategy that Kolbeinn and his colleagues are working on, is land-based and ocean farming. And we are probably one of the, if not the company on Iceland, that has the best starting point for joining into new parts of the industry in Iceland. We have the competence, we have a lot of assets that we already have invested in, and we have the potential for growth in those assets. So we are looking very carefully on what is going on, and we are a company that want to grow, and we look at all opportunities for growth.
So we are very excited to see how this moves on forward. So we are today a company; this was in 2020. We were up to 42,000 tons last year, but we are a bit low on the list on the salmon producing companies when it comes to volume. But the good thing is on Iceland is that we always compare things towards per capita. So Iceland is actually the third biggest producer of salmon per capita in the world. Only Norway and the Faroe Islands are ahead of us. But the potential in this slide has been mentioned before, so I will not spend time on that. But this is an interesting slide. Here is the size of Faroe Islands and the Westfjords compared.
Faroe Islands are around 90,000 tons in 2022, and we have more land and we have more coastline here in the Westfjords, and we know that our sites has a higher carrying capacity. You need more sites in the Faroe Islands than you need in the Westfjords to produce the same amount of fish. So there is naturally a big potential that is beyond what we see on the Faroe Islands in the Westfjords. And also a reflection when Kolbeinn talks about companies in the fjords, the size of the Westfjords and Faroe Islands are pretty similar, and the number of companies as well. And then we have just a few words on the thing that is going to happen to- tomorrow.
It is a big step for to have Icelandic Salmon listed on the First North in Nasdaq Reykjavík. This is something we have been discussing for a long time, and have made the decision to do it, and have now the approval to do it. And it's important for a company which has all their operations on Iceland to make it easy, accessible for Icelandic investors. Both those who are maybe not investing a fortune, but have interest for the industry, and of course, the big sharks and also the pension funds, to create more interest for what we are doing and make more people see the potential and take part in the development of the industry.
We think this is also a big step towards achieving more social acceptance for what we are doing, because when you see Guðrún Anna's charts, there are room for improvement. Yes. And when Icelandic Salmon get listed on First North, we have compared to other listed companies in Iceland, and it will actually, even though we are not a big salmon farming company, but we will be the eleventh biggest company at the stock exchange in Reykjavík. So we are not that small, at least. So to sum up, everything that I have been talking about, and that is, that we see this year we will harvest around 16,000 ton, and we expect a growth going forward, and we see that 26,000 ton is where we will be within the existing licenses today.
We have the smolt capacity, we have the harvest capacity, and we have done almost all investments in sea to produce those 26,000 tons. We need some more cages and a barge or two, maybe, but then we should be there. And to reach that goal of 26,000 ton, the measures we do for the organic growth is to have bigger and more smolts, best operational practice. We hope to get 2 more sites. It's not essential, but it will be beneficial. We get bigger farming areas, and this with a then very limited CapEx. Then if you look into the future, when we are...
We have had some teasers from Kolbeinn before, so we knew a bit how it will be, and if we look at what he says and see the glass half full, and take our existing licenses into account, we think we should be able to produce somewhere up to 35,000 tons if the glass is half full, and we are able to do this in a sustainable way, which I'm very sure we can do. It is a potential there within the existing licenses. And then if we add the license application we have in Ísafjörður and Arnarfjörður, we see somewhere down the road 50,000 tons for Arnarlax in the future. Yes. Then I think I've been through my slides.
Again, thank you all for being here, and I look forward to see you later today. Thank you.