A reception was held at Vinnslustöðin (VSV) factory last weekend, with more than four hundred guests invited to look over the company's pelagic processing factory following its having been re-equipped and upgraded with blast freezer technology, with a great deal of automation incorporated in the new facility.
In designing its new processed for handling pelagic species, VSV opted for blast freezers instead of the conventional plate freezing technology that virtually every other Icelandic processing plant uses. This change of direction took place after VSV's managers had looked carefully at developments in processing technology in Norway, where blast freezing is nothing unusual. The decision to go down this route opens better opportunities for the Asian market, which prefers the quality of blast-frozen fish and is prepared to pay for it.
VSV's factory previously had production capacity for 250 tonnes per day, which has now been boosted to an estimated 420 tonne throughput capacity.
On the east coast of Iceland, fishing and processing company Eskja in Eskifjörður is about to see its new pelagic processing plant opened for business, following the rapid construction schedule that brought together Skaginn, 3X, Marel and other companies in equipping the new factory to start receiving pelagic landings.
The new Eskja factory is expected to be among the most sophisticated and efficient of its kind in the North Atlantic region, providing several dozen new jobs in Eskifjörður, in addition to the more than a hundred temporary jobs the construction called for.
