With its capricious weather, rocky coasts, legends and bright yellow gorse bushes, the island of Chiloélocated 1,000 km south of Santiago, is often compared to Brittany by French visitors to southern Chile. Like France’s West, the Los Lagos region is also one of the country’s main fishing centers, initially thanks to its rich marine biodiversity, but today mainly due to the intensive farming of a non-indigenous species: Atlantic salmon.

Launched in the late 1970s by foreign investors attracted by the region’s ideal conditions for salmon farming – not least its myriad estuaries and pure, cold waters – this activity has become particularly prosperous. With 774,531 tonnes of salmon and trout exported in 2023, mainly to the USA, Japan and Brazil, Chile can boast 47% growth in ten years and a comfortable number-two position worldwide. The industry brought in nearly $6.5 billion in export earnings last year (around 2% of GDP), ” making it the country’s second most important industry, behind copper. “says Raphael Bergoeing, economist and academic at the University of Chile.