The open sea production project will be developed with a national company, near Ilha da Armona, in Olhão. The project will allow Sonae MC to sell more that 900 tons of this species in Continente stores.

In a press release, the retailer states that, through the project, he pretends to “reinforce the bet in national production”, “support to local communities” and at the same time improves the supply of fish in stores “at level of freshness and delivery time”.

The company pretends to, according to the commercial director of fishmonger of Sonae MC, Nuno Vital, extend in the next years the project for other species such as “sea bass, snapper and sea bream”.

“Our goal is to increase the total sales of Portuguese fish by more than 20 percent in the first year of the project, reaching a share of more than 40 percent of the sales of fresh fish. This project will allow to duplicate the offer of Portuguese sea bream through the market”, explained Nuno Vital.

Besides the agreement with the retailer, the national market of fresh fish currently presents, at this moment, a self-sufficiency of only 33 percent for the actual consumption needs of the country, where each Portuguese consumes, on average, 57 kilos of fish per year.

Aquaculture sales are gradually getting a bigger weight in terms of fresh fish and seafood, but 93 perceent of the aquaculture purchases from the national market are imported.