Phu Quy fishermen enter the southern fishing season

Right from the first days of the southern fishing season, Phu Quy fishermen have simultaneously gone out to sea to catch seafood. Phu Quy fishermen are expecting a bumper fishing season and good prices this year as the weather is more favorable and diesel prices decrease.

These days, the beaches on Phu Quy Island are always bustling with boats coming in and out of the port to transport seafood ashore, refuel, and resupply supplies to be ready to continue fishing.

After returning from the sea trip, fisherman Nguyen Van Tao (Long Hai commune, Phu Quy district) said: The annual southern fish season usually starts from the 4th to 9th lunar month. In 2022, oil prices increased so the profits from the trips were not much. Entering the 2023 southern fish season, the weather was relatively favorable combined with the decrease in oil prices, so fishermen were very motivated to go offshore and stick to the sea. "I work as a trawler. My last trip lasted 10 days, the catch was about 1.5 tons, mainly squid, mackerel, tuna...", Mr. Tao said.

Mackerel is abundant in this southern fishing season.

Also according to Mr. Tao’s long experience, due to favorable weather conditions during the Southern fishing season this year, many types of floating fish such as mackerel, squid, cuttlefish, etc. have begun to appear. In particular, the decrease in oil prices has reduced the cost of fishing trips, and fishermen will often go out to sea more often.

Besides large capacity ships that go out to sea for long periods, small capacity ships are also used by fishermen in coastal areas to catch many types of seafood.

Fisherman Doan Van Hong (Long Hai commune, Phu Quy district) often uses small boats with 2 workers to fish about 5-8 nautical miles from the shore; each trip only lasts 2-3 hours, each day can go 2-3 trips. "A short trip can bring a few kilos, sometimes if lucky, up to a few dozen kilos. The seafood is silver pomfret, squid...", Mr. Hong said.

Many fishermen said that seafood transported ashore will be purchased by traders and distributed to localities in and outside the province, the rest will be brought back to sell at the district market. "The economy is starting to recover after the Covid-19 pandemic, so it also helps seafood to be consumed more easily, thanks to which the fishermen's lives are also stable," said one fisherman.

Phu Quy island district has 1,560 boats, of which 589 are boats with a capacity of 90CV or more. Annual exploitation output reaches 30,000 tons; in 2022, seafood exploitation will reach 35,201 tons. Currently, the whole district has 80 united boat groups/530 boats participating in seafood exploitation in the offshore sea, supporting each other in seafood exploitation and in incidents, risks, storms at sea and participating in protecting the sovereignty of the sea and islands.

Up to this point, Phu Quy district has also had 88 newly built boats and 1 upgraded boat according to Decree 67, with a loan capital of more than 816 billion VND. With the attention, many fishermen in the district have boldly changed their fishing methods to increase output and exploitation value.

Source