Salmon farmer nets out of court insurance settlement

MARINE Harvest, the world’s largest salmon farmer, has reached an out-of-court settlement with its insurer over the mass death of fish at its farm in Lochboisdale, on South Uist.

The company, which is based in Norway but has large operations in Scotland, had taken out an insurance policy with Nemi Forsikring in May 2007 and then made a “multi-million-pound” claim the following month, after thousands of fish died at the Western Isles fish farm.

Nemi said the deaths were not covered by the policy and the case came before the Court of Session in Edinburgh in May.

Gail Whealing, legal director at law firm DLA Piper Scotland, has now revealed that her teams in Edinburgh and Oslo reached a settlement with Marine Harvest on behalf of the insurer.

Marine Harvest was founded in Scotland in 1965 by food giant Unilever but passed into foreign ownership in 1999.