There Should Be More Stories About Our Friend, The Cod

If for no other reason the the opportunities afforded to pun-dits:

[oh my Cod, I'm not even sure what this is. Cod? really? world record?]

Last seen in "Lessons From Trading Norwegian Art"

And today's installment from FT Alphaville:

Iceland's tourism boom has a fishy by-product

If Britain hadn’t lost to Iceland in each of the three bilateral “Cod Wars” between 1958 and 1976, Tomas Thor Eiriksson wouldn’t be in business.

Since then, the white demersal fish native to the Atlantic has been one of Iceland's most important exports, and the UK one of its biggest consumers. Most of the Icelandic cod going to Britain is the frozen variety, to be breaded or battered for sale in fish and chip shops up and down the country and supermarket freezers in, er, Iceland.

But the huge growth in tourism since 2000 -- and therefore in the number of passenger flights -- has meant that Iceland has been able to export an increasing amount of fresh fish (most boat journeys are too long to keep the fish from going off). It can be sold to wholesalers and fancy supermarkets like Waitrose, at a premium -- air freight is about four times as expensive as sea freight:

The fresh fish, mainly cod -- but also other species such as haddock and herring -- is carried in the "belly" (the lower deck of the plane, where the luggage is) of every Icelandair flight to the US, Canada and Britain, and to other destinations too: 40 in total. Up to 16 tonnes of the stuff is loaded onto each aeroplane (next time you decide that shrink-wrapping your luggage is silly, you might think again). Many other airlines export fresh Icelandic fish too.

Mikael Tal Gretarsson, head of exports at Icelandair -- which is the biggest airline in Iceland and is in the process of completing an acquisition of budget airline Wow Air -- told us that Britain makes up about a fifth of the market for the 30,000-odd tonnes of fresh cod exported from Iceland each year. North America takes about 50 per cent and continental Europe the rest. But, he said:

The UK market really collapsed after the Brexit vote -- exports to Britain fell by about 30 per cent. Most of that was due to the fall in the pound.

Demand from the US, though, continues to grow, Gretarsson said...MUCH MORE

Previously:
"How Iceland Beat the British in the Four Cod Wars"

"The Future of Fishing Is Big Data and Artificial Intelligence"

With a bit of algo sauce and...yummy...

"World’s First Autonomous Shipping Company Established in Norway"

We've been watching this one for a while as it ticks a few of the boxes:

1. Autonomous
2. Electric
3. Shipping
4. Fertilizer
5. Kristian Birkeland

Our hero

"He also co-founded Norsk Hydro and got his picture on the cover of the Rolling Stone Norway's 200 kr banknote:

The note became invalid at the end of last year and the old boy was replaced by a cod and a herring...."