€20m salmon farming contract for Connemara

Galway Bay fm newsroom – The salmon farming company, Marine Harvest, has signed a contract with a local company in Connemara for the processing of a projected 20 million euro worth of fish next year. The processing company, Cill Chiaráin Éisc Teo, is based in Cill Chiaráin and it currently employs over 40 people. Marine Harvest Ireland has 15 people employed at its base close to an Aird Mhóir in west Connemara where it began operations last year. The company is the largest producer of farmed salmon in Ireland. The arrangements for processing locally has NOW been copper fastened in a contract between Marine Harvest and Cill Chiaráin Éisc Teo – a processing plant based in Cill Chiaráin. Cill Chiaráin Éisc, which presently employes 45 people is part of ISPG, a marketing body for Irish organic farmed salmon. The pumping of water by the Marine Harvest company from Loch an Oir – one of the sources for the local water scheme – to prevent and treat amoebic gill disease in salmon cages caused some controversy in the past month. A formal application has now been made for planning permission for a pipeline from the lake.