The Minister said: "This is an immense shock for the entire society, the companies, the fishermen, fish processors and the communities that depend on capelin the most. But we had no other option because only a small number of capelin has been found."

The news comes just six months after a large cut in the annual cod quota for the same reason and will be a huge blow to Iceland's already beleaguered fishing industry.

Glitnir Bank said yesterday that much was now at stake for the seafood industry if there is no recovery in the capelin stock.

Since early January, the Marine Research Institute’s ships have only managed to locate between 200,000 to 270,000 tons of capelin and with continued fishing there would not be a large enough stock left to ensure sustainability. A school count of at least 400,000 capelin needs to exist for sustainable fishing.

The director of the pelagic division at the institute, Thorsteinn Sigurdsson said: “We have no explanation for why the capelin isn’t reproducing. The numbers on young capelin the year before last indicated that we would see many more adult fish now."

Mr Gudfinnsson said the Marine Research Institute will continue to look for capelin “so we won’t miss anything. The capelin is capricious, so maybe we’ll find more of it after all.”

According to Icelandic fishing sources, this is the worst capelin fishing season since 1982-83 when next to no capelin were caught. The export value of this season’s catch only amounts 10 million euros, one twentieth of its peak value in 2002 when the export of capelin returned over 200-million euros. The capelin fishing moratorium means that the three largest capelin companies in Iceland will lose up to 70-million euros.

Traditionally, there are two capelin seasons in Iceland with the winter season starting early in the year. Commercially capelin is used for fish meal, salmon feed and oil industry products, but it also has uses as a food. The flesh resembles herring and capelin roe is considered a high value product, especially in Asian countries like Japan where it sought after because of its claimed aphrodisiac qualities.

www.fishupdate.com is published by Special Publications. Special Publications also publish FISHupdate magazine, Fish Farmer, the Fish Industry Yearbook, the Scottish Seafood Processors Federation Diary, the Fish Farmer Handbook and a range of wallplanners.

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