Information relating to mortality tracking and disease monitoring for farmed salmon: EIR release

Information requested

Information relating to mortality tracking and disease monitoring for farmed salmon, specifically in relation to the reported mortality figures at the Portree site operated by Bakkafrost. In a recent earnings call transcript, Bakkafrost’s CEO stated that “The input mortality [at Portree] was19% within the first 90 days. […] they did not have the capability to handle the stress events thatthey were going through, and they caught this Pasteurella virus.” (Source: Bakkafrost Q3 2025 earnings call transcript, Investing.com)

I see those mortality figures do not appear in your mortality spreadsheet because they occurred within 6 weeks of input.

Please provide the following information:

1) Awareness of Mortality Figures

a. At the time the mortality at Portree was occurring, was FHI Scotland aware of the 19% mortality figure within the first 90 days as reported by the operator?

b. If yes, please provide the correspondence, records, reports, or internal notes demonstrating such awareness, including dates and sources.

c. If no, please confirm that FHI Scotland did not have records of this mortality figure at the time.

This part of the request will be responded to as a request for information under the EIRs

2) Mortality Tracking and Disease Outbreaks

a. Does FHI Scotland track mortalities occurring within the first 6 weeks of seawater transfer to sea sites (i.e., before data appears in the publicly available mortality spreadsheet)?

b. If such early mortalities are tracked, please describe the process, data sources, and how they are used in disease monitoring or outbreak prevention efforts.

c. If they are not tracked, please explain the policy rationale for not tracking mortalities in this early period and whether any effort is made to obtain or use such data to identify and mitigate disease outbreaks (e.g., Pasteurella or other pathogens).

This part of the request will be responded to outwith the EIRs under additional information.

Response

This part of the request will be responded to outwith the EIRs under additional information.

As the information you have requested is ‘environmental information’ for the purposes of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs), we are required to deal with your request under those Regulations. We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA.

This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. This is essentially a technical point and has no material effect on the outcome of your request.

The answer to your first question which was covered by the EIRs is:

The fish health inspectorate (FHI) were aware of the full mortality figures (although not specifically the 19% total for the first 90 days) for the Portree sites at the time the sites were experiencing elevated mortality (Note: Portree is authorised as two separate sites – Portree and Portree Outer). It is standard practice during FHI inspections to review the full mortality records since the last visit, generally looking at weekly totals, and note on case records the recent mortality and any particular peaks in mortality over the time period checked. The FHI attended both sites on 24 September 2025. The case records for these visits have been published on the Scottish Government website in line with our proactive publication plan. To assist you with locating the records, the case numbers for the visits are 20250361 for Portree and 20250362 for Portree Outer. The records can be found at the following link:

Cases+20250342-20250363.pdf

The case records include the date range for which the records were checked and for both sites includes the first 90 days post stocking. However, the FHI did not calculate the total mortality figure for the first 90 at this time so we did not have the specific detail of 19% mortality in that time period. Copies of mortality records were not retained following inspection.

Under regulation 6(1)(b) of the EIRs, we do not have to give you information which is already publicly available and easily accessible to you in another form or format. If, however, you do not have internet access to obtain this information from the website(s) listed, then please contact me again and I will send you a paper copy.

Additional information provided out with the EIRs

Under regulation 9 of the EIRs (our duty to provide advice and assistance) we would like to provide you with the following additional information in response to the questions you raised:

The FHI do not track mortalities occurring at sea water salmon farms within the first six weeks post transfer from a freshwater rearing site. Mortality occurring during this time period is not part of the voluntary reporting agreement as losses at this stage are mainly associated with transfer and the inclusion of the data would serve little benefit to support aquatic animal health surveillance. However, data from the first six weeks post transfer is considered and assessed during site inspections conducted by the FHI.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at https://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.