Interviews with the pelagic sector - the herring and mackerel industry - have brought forth quite different perceptions of what will shape the future, and not least, different desires for future development.
What's happening?
The scenarios will make visible general developmental traits in society and other changes that can be important for this industry. The main goal is to provide the businesses with a better basis for making strategic choices and good market adaptations.
As regards herring, the migration pattern is an element that can affect which countries become recipients of the catches. One significant developmental trait can be a strong increase in the herring landings.
-
What can happen if they are halved because the herring migrate into the Icelandic zone and are landed in Iceland? How can the businesses prepare for such a situation, and what are the possibilities for the businesses that best utilise the new situation, asks Project Manager at Fiskeriforskning, Audun Iversen.
-
What possibilities are there, for example, in moving the sales from traditional fishmongers to supermarkets, in the internationalisation of the supermarket chains and that large markets are thus reached through few purchasing agents?
-
How will access to raw materials be, both as regards quantity and price? These are the kinds of questions we want included in the future vision, says Iversen.
- Can, for example, rising sea temperatures affect the migration pattern? Will the herring migrate northwards? And will the mackerel follow the herring? The questions, challenges and possibilities are many, says the scientist in conclusion.
Back to the future
An important goal is that the actors in the seafood industry, by "visiting the future", can better see the consequences of possible developmental traits and be prepared to carry out initiatives that can utilise changes in the market to their advantage.
Simultaneously with focusing on traits in the pelagic sector, the general trends, such as globalisation, increased consumer power and chain power, new products, new actors and new technology, will lead to changes in the supply and demand sides in the coming years. The future will also be affected by stricter requirements for environment and ethics, increased flow of information and composition, and faster changes. These will also be baked into the scenarios.
The project, which is financed by the Research Council of Norway, was started in 2006 and will continue through the end of 2007.
