Good morning, welcome to the presentation of the 4th quarter for Marine Harvest in the 4th quarter of 2015. Together with me to present today, I have the CFO, Ivan Vindheim, and he will come back to the numbers in more details later on in the presentation. We just go straight to the highlights for this quarter. An operational EBIT of NOK 837 million. Good contribution here from a Norwegian fish. Approximately or not approximately NOK 809 million came from Norwegian fish through value added through sales. All-time high result in feed. We produced or sold 88,400 tons of fish feed. That's a new record for us. We also made an EBIT of NOK 74 million, which is another new record for the feed segment. One major negative incident or surprise for us in this quarter was the start-up of our operation in Rosyth.
We lost NOK 95 million on this 1 factory in the quarter. I will come back to that in more detail later on. In terms of demand, strong demand both in Europe and in Asia. In Europe, supply up by 4.6% and prices in the currency they buy fish in was up 6.2%. In terms of the conditions in Americas, maybe 1 of the toughest quarters price-wise on Chilean fish and even for Canadian fish. Supply was up 10.8% in this quarter. Prices on Canadian fish down 12.7% in gutted equivalent prices and down 22% compared to the 4th quarter in 2014 on Chilean fish. The prices on Chilean fish in this quarter, probably lowest, at least in historical times. In terms of financing, we issued a convertible at EUR 340 million at a coupon of 0.125%, which makes our financing more flexible and better for the future.
The board has decided to pay out the dividend here at NOK 1.40 per share. Some key financial numbers. Top-line growth for Marine Harvest in 2015 was good. We increased the top line by 10% and in the fourth quarter by 17%. As you can see, the operational EBIT down from slightly north of NOK 1 billion- NOK 837 million in the fourth quarter of 2015. The majority here or the explanation is NOK 181 million lost in Chile compared to the result in Q4 2014. That's the biggest impact factor. Then also the loss in our value-added entity has an impact on this number. Volume slightly up from 105,000 tons in Q4 2014- 110,000 tons in Q4 2015.
If we take a look at the salmon prices, the underlying prices in Europe has been good and increasing, as I already stated, 6.2% up in EUR in the quarter on a supply growth at 4.2%. In terms of Americas, very low prices during the fourth quarter, but we have seen a rebound end of December and continued into January and even also into February. Prices are up in Chile with approximately $1 since the bottom in the fourth quarter, which obviously will have an impact on earnings, but it's still far from putting our Chilean operation into a profitable level. It's heading in the right direction. Canadian prices are as well down, but not as much as Chilean prices.
If you look at price achievement, just to start with the Norwegian prices, it is important, if you look at the Nasdaq price for the fourth quarter, it is at 45 or slightly above 45. It is important to remember that is not a volume-weighted price. The Nasdaq price in October was around 40, the Nasdaq price in November, 42, and the Nasdaq price in December, 51 NOK. When you do the math there, you can soon get the wrong picture in terms of how is the cost of Marine Harvest compared to the price. If we have a lot of volume in October and November as we had, and in addition have wrong sizes of fish because we had forced harvest, especially in Region Mid, the cheap price is certainly not 45. Still, we managed EBIT around 100%.
Based on contracts, even though the contracts are not at NOK 45, we achieved about the same as Nasdaq on all the fish in a volume-weighted scenario. On Scottish fish, 110%, some good contracts. It's important to note that the Scottish fish here is in high competition with Norwegian fish at the moment and is challenged there in terms of profitability. Canada, no contracts, and we are about at spot price. Chile is slightly down, and the major explanation there is a weaker market in Brazil, where we have been strong historically, or a weaker price achievement in Brazil. To explain, to go from the operational EBITDA in Q4 2014- Q4 2015. You will see here feed doing slightly better. Farming, obviously worse performance, and the majority here is already explained with the Chilean activities.
Also here is a higher cost in most of the other operations and mostly due to biology. You see market and consumer products being NOK 29 million worse, and I will explain that in more detail when we get to that operation. To the Norwegian operations. Just change this a little bit so I can read what's on here. A good result in the quarter in total money at NOK 12.14 per kilo is a good result. There's no doubt about that. It's highly price-driven. Cost is up, but so are prices. To me, the cost development is concerning basically throughout the sector, especially in areas where you have really issue with sea lice, and I'll get back to that when we come into the different regions.
We have, however, bought 5% increased MAB on 50 licenses in Region South, in the region Agder, where we have not treated for sea lice for, well, now soon the last 6 years, and we are way beyond the limit. There are different scenarios in the Norwegian farming area. If we then look at the contract portfolio, worth to mention here is that the contract volume in January was as high as 79%, and that's on the back of lower volumes and lack of fish that has already been harvested during Q4. For the first quarter 2016, contract here is 56%, slightly above actually our limit. We should stop at 50. Because of lower harvest volumes and fish already harvested in Region Mid, we surpassed that limit in this quarter.
In terms of the different regions, quite the variation in terms of profitability, NOK 8.9 per kilo in Region South is probably a good performance in that region per se. Still some issues around PD, CMS, and in part of this region, which goes up to Sogn og Fjordane in Norway, we still have issues with sea lice. Region West, decent or actually a very good result, NOK 16.2 per kilo, up from Q4 2014. Also here, a lot of extra cost is going into keeping sea lice down. The worst-performing region in this quarter is Region Mid, NOK 4.5 in margin, and this is on the back of harvesting out 2-3 kilo fish. Everybody that understands the cost development of farmed fish understands that 2-3 kilo fish has a much higher cost than a harvest fish at 4-5 kilo.
High cost on the fish, and also when you harvest out smaller fish, you drop down in price. You get it from both sides, lower price, higher cost. This is because we had to harvest out 2 or 3 sites during this quarter because we lost control over sea lice, and the whole area, in fact, lost control over sea lice. I think the action that's been taken over the last few months with investments in new equipment will help the situation for 2016, but it's still not over. This has to be taken seriously. Region North, which goes from Folla and up to Kvænangen, is in a much better situation in regards to sea lice.
If you look at this in a 5-year perspective, well, the situation in regards to sea lice have not been better over the last 5 years. A different scenario. I think Region North going forward will perform well. Yeah. What is the solution? Well, the government has come up with an incentive for the farming companies in Norway to develop new technology. You can apply for licenses if you have good projects that solve issues around sea lice, escaped fish, maybe even taking out particles from feces and potential feed spills from our farming operation. We have started with one concept and applied for 14 licenses there. This is a system that is interesting.
Still very early days, but if we can get this to work the way we want it to work, both in terms of fish logistics, looks very promising, in terms of certainly sea lice and in terms of escaped fish, the same. Also, we will try to take out the particles and use that for energy. This has a lot of advantages compared to today's farm. Cost-wise, well, we will not do this if we're not decreasing cost of production. When we know that the Norwegian farming industry is using between 3 billion-5 billion NOK just on sea lice, and in addition to that, a lot of cost in regards to mortality, it can be a solution. We will hopefully, if we get our licenses approved, start up this fall and then take it from there, gradually moving up.
Our target is to have one site to be able to harvest out 14,000 tons-15,000 tons out of that one site and maybe around 10,900 tons to do that at good cost and prove the concept and without impact on environment. That is interesting. Scotland. Here, be aware that the Scottish number is impacted by Rosyth, which is the value-added operation, which I will come back to. They lost NOK 95 million in this quarter and NOK 87 million on Scottish fish. That had a direct impact of NOK 5.53 per kilo on the Scottish operation. In addition to that, there is still room for improvement, both in terms of sea lice and algae blooms that we've had in Scotland in this quarter. We, in fact, expect cost to increase going forward.
We have taken action in Scotland, changed operation in Q1, but we will not see the result of that before the second half of 2016. Over to Canada and our Canadian operation, despite a market that is going very much against them, and remember they had a reduction in prices there in Canadian dollars of 12.7%, still made money, and in that regard, performs fairly well. Also there, challenges in regards to biology going forward. Chilean operation. One good sign here is that smolt output and smolt transfer over time now is going down. We've seen that over the last four to five months, it's down 17% in total. I would say finally. It's the only thing that can save the Chilean industry is a strong reduction in biomass. It's not happened because of regulation.
I think maybe finally financial laws kicks in, and if you do not have money, it's hard to farm fish. Hopefully, this will help both in terms of a tighter market and also in regards to better biology. The long-term solution for Chile is in fact to get better regulations and more predictable regulations. You cannot just kick in and start over again if now prices, that they probably will go up, that you just can go in and transfer more smolt. Discipline here is essential to get this business to work. Ireland, Faroe Islands. Good contribution from Faroe Islands at 16 NOK per kilo in this quarter. Remember, we had 2,900 ton in the quarter. Ireland at break-even level. Both places we expect, in fact, cost to go up. In the Faroe Islands, though, I think price achievement will make up for the cost increase.
Also in Faroe Islands, it's worth paying attention to biology going forward. In regards to consumer products, there's a lot of positive things happening in the marketplace. Know that the expansion of new products both in Germany, in the U.K., in Southern Europe, is really growing the category of salmon. That is underpinned, and we've seen that also in regards to prices, what we have achieved in first quarter but obviously also in the fourth quarter of 2016. This result, NOK 89 million compared to NOK 117 million in Q4 2014, is impacted by this one factory, Rosyth, with NOK 95 million. If we had adjusted for that, the result would have been 5.3% EBIT margin for the consumer product in the quarter, which would have been okay.
We have failed in Scotland, and the start-up cost there with the contract to a major retailer in the U.K. has been a challenge for us. There's no doubt. There's a few reasons for that. One is that we got maybe much more volume than expected because previous supplier went through. We have had extreme focus on delivery to the client, making sure that the client gets his products. We have achieved that target. 97% order fulfillment is extremely good. The customer is happy, but it has cost us a lot of money in terms of we basically started up a factory from zero, took in 300, 400 people and had to train them in filleting and so on, and especially on yield, we failed in December, particularly. Part of it should have been avoided. There's no doubt about it.
A recovery plan is in place. We have taken action, but we still think that we will lose NOK 50 million in the first quarter of 2016 and then gradually break even. Feed, it's on a different planet. We, as you know, compare feed prices too. We still buy quite a bit of feed, but based on the benchmark with the producers, we managed to make NOK 74 million in this quarter, 7.8% EBIT margin. More impressive is that we are able to increase the output of this factory. We did 95,900 tons of production in the quarter, compared to 67,000 last year, and are delivering a high percentage in this quarter on a Norwegian volume. Good production. We think we'll be able to do about 310,000 tons of fish feed in 2016 out of this factory, and it still can be fine-tuned, which is interesting.
The feed is also performing well on our fish. I think on the back of the success, the board has approved a new investment in Scotland. That will be a factory that will produce approximately 170,000 tons and will supply our operations in Ireland, in Scotland, in Faroe Islands, and certainly also freshwater diets to the whole of Europe, which is an interesting segment in terms of profitability. We will continue with this and gradually develop the business. This investment will happen in 2017 and 2018, and our plan is to be ready for delivery in May 2018 when our contracts with the other feed suppliers run out in Europe. Ivan, it's all yours on financials.
Thank you, Alf-Helge, good morning, everybody. As usual, we start with the P&L. The fourth quarter saw us make a turnover of approximately NOK 8.1 billion, which is up approximately 17% year-over-year. For the full year, we made approximately NOK 28 billion, which is a year-over-year increase of approximately 10%. Operation EBIT in the fourth quarter, NOK 837 million, which is heavily impacted by the losses in Chile and Rosyth, as Alf-Helge has already touched upon. Further down in the P&L, as usual, a big positive biomass adjustment in the fourth quarter on the back of increasing prices towards the end of the quarter, NOK 946 million. Net financial items this time, highly impacted by the increase in share price and the fair valuation or mark-to-market valuation of the convertible bonds. Earning per share, the underlying earning per share, NOK 1.27 this quarter.
For 2015 as a whole, NOK 4.70 per share. Net cash flow per share, negative NOK 1. We will come back to the explanation of the negative numbers there and NOK 0.13 per share for 2015 full year. Harvest volumes in the fourth quarter, 110,000 tons approximately, somewhat down compared to our guidance after the third quarter but year-over-year, an increase of 5%. 2015 full year volumes, 420,000 tons, which is more or less in line with the volumes for 2014. Return on capital employed, fourth quarter annualized, 13.1%, and for 2015 as a whole, 12.6%. Much about the P&L. Over to the balance sheet or what we call financial position these days.
The total balance sheet amounts to approximately NOK 40 billion at year-end, up from NOK 37 billion compared to year-end 2014 or the last year. For the previous year, the increase is mainly explained by organic growth, FX, and cost increase. Net interest-bearing debt year-end NOK 9.6 billion and an equity ratio of approximately 45%. Over to the cash flow statement. We started the quarter with a net interest-bearing debt of NOK 8.8 billion. We made an EBITDA of approximately NOK 1.2 billion. We tied up working capital as planned and in line with the forecast, NOK 0.7 billion. Pay taxes of approximately NOK 0.1 billion, which also is in line with the forecast. In total had NOK 0.2 billion in cash flow from operations. The negative cash flow per share in the fourth quarter is mainly explained by the tie-up of working capital.
We know that this industry is seasonal, we also know that the first and the second quarter are the quarters where we release this tie-up of working capital. In terms of CapEx, NOK 554 million, also in line with the forecast. Of the investments, NOK 160 million is related to the remainder of the licenses in the Acuinova acquisition. Net interest expenses paid, NOK 108 million. Other items, NOK 525 million. That amount is related to the convertible bond we issued in the fourth quarter and the capitalization of the equity element of it. To be precise, NOK 484 million. Dividend distributed, NOK 630 million, which corresponds to NOK 1.40 per share. FX effects not mainly, but purely on the net interest-bearing debt balance, NOK 156 million negative. All in all, NOK 9.6 billion net interest-bearing debt at year-end.
At least according to ourselves, in line with our internal forecast and what we have tried to guide the market on. Over to the cash flow guidance for 2016. In terms of working capital tie-up, much more modest this year, NOK 300 million. CapEx, NOK 1.8 billion. Please bear in mind that total depreciation for this year is approximately NOK 1.4 billion. When I say this year, I mean 2016. For 2015, it was NOK 1.25 billion approximately. Interest expenses, NOK 270 million. Tax payables according to the last estimate from our advisors, NOK 700 million. The board has based upon 2016 volumes and building business increased or revised the net interest-bearing debt target from EUR 950 million- EUR 1.05 billion. Quarterly dividend, as said by Alf-Helge Aarskog, NOK 1.40 per share.
It is to be paid out the 2nd of March, and I think ex-date is the 26th of this month. We have just released a stock notice, so please read it after this presentation. We have also reached a point where we have decided to start to report in euros. Marine Harvest has managed its cash flow in euros since 2006. As you know, the predominant cash flow in the farming industry is euros, accounting for more than 50% of our net cash flow. Our financing is also more or less in euros. As from the first quarter of 2016, we will also start to report our numbers in line with what we actually do. This is the last quarter with NOK. We have also taken the liberty to present all the cash flow guidance here in euros.
Next time you will only see euros in this slide. Overview of financing. One big change since last time we spoke. We issued a convertible bond in November of EUR 340 million. Extremely attractive terms according to ourselves. 0.125% coupon and a conversion premium of 35%. This is by far the best terms we have achieved on financing so far. We are very happy with that issuance. Much about the financial numbers. Over to supply and demand. We start with supply and the historical numbers as we used to do. Supply increase in the fourth quarter of approximately 7%. That was more than what we foresaw and expected due to required harvesting in Norway and biological issues or challenges in Chile. Our forecast when we started the quarter was 1%. These numbers have obviously an impact on the supply numbers for 2016.
We will revisit it later on in the presentation. Recovery volumes from Scotland as expected, and also strong growth from Canada as volumes have recovered, both from Marine Harvest but also for one of the other farmers in that region. There are not many farmers in that region, there are 3. Reference prices. The development in Europe was good. The supply increase was 4%. The increase in the market currency, euros, was 6%. I.e., stronger demand than the supply. In NOK terms even higher, but that is due to FX. For Americas, unfortunately, it was the other way around. In the market currency, U.S. dollars, it was substantially down as much as 21.7% for Chile and 12.7% for North America if we compare price back to the farmer. According to the graph at the bottom here, we bottom out during the fourth quarter.
The price increased towards year-end, I'm talking about Americas now, and has continued to increase so far in January. Normally we see this pattern because of the Lent season which helps with the demand, I also think it's right to say that the prices in Americas, they also increase on the back of higher prices in Europe. In Europe the prices after Christmas, actually in December as well, have been historically good. The 17% decline in volumes which Alf-Helge Aarskog talked about, that effect I do not think we will see before we reach 2017. We are still below break-even levels in Chile, although we are improving, it's still far from great. Over to demand. In total, we will say demand is extremely good. I think in the end of the day, the prices is the final proof of that, of course with some adjustments.
If we look into the various regions, strong demand in EU and Asia, which are the main markets, particularly the first one. The U.S. market I already commented on. Demand-wise, Americas have been challenging in 2015. We really hope that we now see the start of better times. In the end of the day, in order to get this fixed in the long run, we need some stronger tools which Alf-Helge Aarskog mentioned there. Again, we hope that we have finished with the bottom. Impressive demand in Brazil. They are struggling with their economy. They're also struggling with their currency. Adjusted for that it's extremely impressive the demand we see in that region. China, Hong Kong still affected by a lack of large-size salmon, also trading barriers. We haven't seen any help from the governments in the previous year. Much about demand.
Over to supply. The supply situation from a price point of view and not from a customer point of view is good. It looks like there will be a shortage of salmon in 2016. This will obviously have an impact on prices. I think we have already seen it so far this year. From a price point of view it looks good. For long-term players, it's not that good. Building markets, you need to increase the production and the tons of fish. We did not build this industry with such numbers. Hopefully some of the measures we see within the industry can help to turn this around because going forward it's very hard to see that we will have any significant supply increase if we do not sort out the biological issues we are struggling with in the various regions.
Over to our internal volumes. We are growing, but not much. Last year we were stable. This year we are aiming for a small growth. We have taken down the guidance since last time we met by 4,000 tonnes due to Chile and biological issues there. In terms of the other regions, we are stable. I also think these numbers support the previous slide we have been through. With that, I would like to say thank you and pass the word to Alf-Helge Aarskog.
Thank you very much, Ivan. Just to sum up and look a little bit ahead. Market balance here and the outlook for that is to be tight going forward, and that is supported by future prices, which I think must be at a record high level. It's around NOK 50 per kilo and EUR 5.1 per kilo for the entire 2016. In terms of consumer demand, strong both in Europe and Asia. In Americas, we see improvement, but it's still early days, and it's still challenging market condition for Chilean salmon also going forward in the near future. Board has decided, as already mentioned, to pay out a dividend of NOK 1.4 per share. Euros is the currency as from next quarterly presentations. All numbers will be in currency going forward for Marine Harvest.
It's going to be a challenge both for you and for me, but we'll give it a go, and this has been the currency we actually should have reported in for a long time. I would like to invite you all to Bjugn to take a look at the world's most modern feed plant. At the same time, we'll have a capital markets day on June 1st and June 2nd. More information there will follow shortly. With that, I will say thank you for this time and then open up for question. Please state your name and employer, and we will try to answer our best. Marius was first in line.
Marius, Koza Bank. 2 questions. I think the exceptional items you have reported for Norway is probably one of the highest I've ever seen. You also guide on the high cost in the first half of 2016. Is this level of exceptional items the level we should expect on the first part of 2016? The second one is on the Faroe Island. You raised some concerns about the biology there. Can you explain a little bit what you mean about that?
Yeah. Exceptional items. As you know, sea lice treatments is higher in the 3rd quarter and the 4th quarter normally because of temperature and so on. A reduction there in 1st quarter and 2nd quarter is to hope for and will most likely happen on exceptional items. In terms of what's going to happen in 3rd quarter and 4th quarter in this year, in 2016, well, it depends a lot on how well prepared the industry is in the different regions. There's been a lot of investments into equipment that will remove lice with flushers and so on and RAS that hopefully will help on this issue. It's too early to say, and it is about discipline in the industry. I think especially in Region Mid, everybody's been hurt terribly bad, and I think everybody is much better prepared for the coming season of sea lice.
As I said and you correctly pointed out, also in the Faroe Islands, they're not empty of sea lice in that region either. We have to be prepared and pay attention to what's going on also there. More questions. There's one in the back there. Yeah, that's Kolbjørn.
Kolbjørn Giskeødegård, Nordea Markets. Two questions from me as well. First, about the contract share. As you pointed out, you have a very high contract share for various reasons. Just one fundamental question. Were you too bearish on the price outlook or expectation for 2016 when you entered into because the volumes is also higher in absolute terms from the contract you signed last year? Or is this just a part of your industrial approach, sort of having more volumes on long-term conditions? The second one goes on the CapEx guidance. It's down for 2016 compared to 2015, but what should we expect from 2017 when you are launching these eggs and in addition, you are also building a new feed factory? Can you say something about that? Thanks.
I can do the contracts, you can do the CapEx afterwards. Let's start with the contracts first. Certainly, it's part of changing business model to a certain extent. We have larger and larger retail clients where we gradually have to renew contracts going forward, that's where you will see also in absolute terms and volume-wise, we are up from 23,000 tons guided on Q1 2022, 3,000 in the last quarter to 30,000 tons outlet volumes, which is probably what you point out correctly. That has to do with rolling over contracts and also taking contracts on fairly good prices with big clients. I think long-term strategy, that is a good move. We might lose out on some spot margins. Yeah. Then, Ivan, if you can say something about CapEx for 2016.
I think I should start with saying that we are not guiding on the 2017 CapEx now. The process is that the board approves the budget in December. We are almost one year anticipating events. The egg is 1 of the big news these days. They are dependent on the application of the licenses. Based upon that, we cannot tell because we don't know the size of the projects. We do not know if we get any licenses, and with no licenses, there will be no project and zero CapEx. I think we have to revert to the market when we have more information about that project. At the moment, it's pure an R&D project with no approved CapEx whatsoever. In terms of the feed factory, that is to be built mainly in 2017/2018, and the total number you know.
The phasing of it, well, 60/40, I would say, on top of my mind. That project is approved, so, and already announced.
Very good. One in the back there.
Vidar Strat, ABG. We've obviously seen very high prices at the start of the year. I'm just wondering, what price do you see industrial buyers being more reluctant to take volumes? Is there some limits in EUR or in NOK where you see some less willingness to buy?
It's a tough question to answer on and it's almost hypothetical, but what we see is less volatility in prices in EUR. We see future prices, as already said, at EUR 5.1. Where that kind of breaking point is hard to state. What we see is demand is good for salmon in general. It's also about what kind of products you are able to develop and what kind of margin you are taking out of the different products. It's hard to give a good answer on that exact question. It's a very good question, but I don't think maybe there is one good answer either to that question. We see prices trending up also in EUR, not only in NOK, which is good and which even also comment on really underpin the demand.
The proof is in the pudding and that people are willing to pay for the fish, which they are doing.
Henning on Pareto Securities. Can you say something more about the Rosyth plant? Is fixed contracts a part of that losses? That's one question. Can you also say something more about the chilled segments and is that Europe or is it also including the U.S.? A few comments on the ongoing discussions on the regulations in Chile.
Yeah. If you start with Rosyth, I'll just give you a brief background on that. We got Rosyth when we bought Mowi. It was an empty shell, a totally empty plant. We have been supplying a major retailer in the U.K. for many years really in terms of fish, and they wanted us to also take on production of value-added. Which we think long-term is a great idea because we can continue to develop products, and that's really why we're here. This is a big contract. It's around several thousand tons of value-added products. I will not go in detail on that, but it's a huge contract. We got everything over a few months and more than actually what was planned in December because of the previous supplier withdrew.
We took on a challenge, probably bigger than we were set up to do and had planned to do, and failed in many aspects, especially around the cost side of things. We succeeded in one part, which is very important. We delivered on our promises, and we delivered great products. The customer is very happy. Long-term, I believe that will pay off. Again, to come back to what needs to happen to turn this around, it is about training people. We are moving people from Poland in here and management from other places, and we will get this right. Maybe we underestimated the challenge of taking on such a big contract with new people overnight. That is a mistake, and there's only thing we can do with that is to regret and make sure we don't make it again.
That was on the Rosyth side. In terms of chilled, and chilled is basically for us, Mowi and Kritsen
Both delivered great results. As I already mentioned, Mowi had an EBIT result of around 3.54% in the quarter. Kritsen was as well making good money on smoked salmon in this quarter. The chilled part, which is a big part of the operation, is doing well. On to the last question, which was Chilean regulations. That is a slow-moving operation, to say the least. I think the government should go in and take part in the discussion, change the law, change the regulation for the future, and really make some impact. We're trying with coming up with industry alternatives and voluntary solutions. With many players and a not consolidated industry, that is hard to make right, to say as such. As of now, there's no solution on regulations in Chile. That is the answer.
Ole Sandak Nyrjeme. Are you guiding down the volumes in Norway versus the third quarter 2015, while your own volume guidance is kept unchanged? Is that because you're shifting volumes from 2015 into 2016, or is it something else?
You want to answer that, Ivan Vindheim?
I can. Are you asking about our numbers or the-
About your guidance for region volumes to drop, but your own volumes from Norway is not dropping.
Well, that's true, maintained. We had a reserve when we released our focus to the market in the third quarter. Not a big reserve, a small reserve. We are confident in our own numbers. In terms of the total numbers, the numbers, of course, consisting of the entire industry, it is very hard for me to confirm number per number. Based upon the individuals, the average harvest weight we see, we are quite convinced about that we will see a decline in 2016 for Norway. We are. Once again, about our own numbers, we are quite confident with that we will deliver it. That being said, it's today the 17th of February, so there is still 10 months to go and much can happen. This is about temperatures, it's about weather obviously, it's about biology, et cetera. A lot of unknown factors.
Based upon the information we have today, we are confident with our own numbers.
Okay, there's a good question. Just regarding the biology, you seem to be quite concerned, and it seems to be increasing in all different producing regions. Is this a unfortunate coincidence, or should we be more concerned?
Well, certainly, when we comment, what I said was maybe a little bit more a mixed picture, especially if you go into Norway. I can do it again. In northern part of Norway, for Marine Harvest, lice situation has not been better in 5 years. That's Region North. Maybe not so concerned in that region, seems to be under good control. Region Mid, uncertain. We've made investments. It's wintertime. We'll see in the fall. On the back of what happened in 2015, well, we better be prepared.
I was thinking more in terms of the global scene, the U.K., the Chile-
Yeah
Canada along Norway.
No, it's a fair point. I think, well, it's certainly not as good as we hope for. Just to look at the cost side of things, which seems to be that biomass levels maybe are above what nature can take in the way we produce as of now, with the solution we have to certain biological issues, especially sea lice, and to a certain extent, if you go to Chile, SRS. I think that's fair to say. That's why we are looking at new solutions, trying to find new ways to farm fish, trying to find new ways to deal with sea lice, both in terms of sea lice strategy and other ways. If we don't change things around, well, this is not going to grow into 2050 target and 6 times more fish.
Bruce Nixon, Fernley. With the current switch you we're seeing in Russia with a shift to more frozen fish, are you selling less fish to Russia from your Chilean business than your competitors? Well, are you benefiting from the premiums they're paying in Russia for the frozen fish, or aren't you selling to Russia from Chile?
We are selling to Russia from Chile, but we are certain that we get our money. That's also part of the business. If people pay up front, we sell. We take advantage of it if we can secure our money. That's more important for us than anything else. Then we hope that the Russian market will be open for Norwegian fish shortly. That's it. Thank you very much for coming