Many tuna fishing boats are on shore.

Recently, the cost of sea trips has increased, while the output is low and the selling price has not increased, leading to low efficiency of sea trips, causing many tuna fishing boat owners to keep their boats on shore to avoid losses.

Ineffective voyages

Meeting us at Hon Ro port, fisherman Tran Ngoc Dong - owner of 5 tuna fishing boats in Nam Nha Trang ward shared: “Recently, the operations of yellowfin and big-eye tuna fishing boats in the province have been difficult, most of the boats are operating at a loss, very few trips break even, and very few boats make a profit. For example, my family has 5 boats specializing in yellowfin and big-eye tuna fishing, in the trip last July, out of 4 boats going out to sea, only 1 broke even, 3 boats made a loss. Previously, in the trip in June, with 4 fishing boats going out to sea, 2 broke even, 2 boats made a loss.”

Fishing boats anchored in Hon Ro port waters.

Similarly, fisherman Phan Viet Long - owner of a tuna fishing boat in Nam Nha Trang ward said that his family's fishing boat has been docked for 3 months now due to continuous losses. Mr. Long shared that in the first 4 trips of the year, his family's fishing boat went offshore and was supported with fuel costs according to Decision No. 48/2010 of the Prime Minister on a number of policies to encourage and support exploitation, aquaculture and seafood exploitation services in distant sea areas, so the trips were still profitable. The trips that were not supported with fuel costs were all loss-making, combined with the scarcity of seafaring labor, so he decided to dock the boat.

According to fishing boat owners, recently, the cost of a fishing trip has increased by about 30% compared to before. Specifically, previously, the average cost of a fishing boat for 20-22 days was about 90 million VND, now it has increased to 135 million VND. Meanwhile, the fishing output is low, each boat only reaches an average of 500-600 kg/trip; the price of yellowfin and big-eye tuna purchased at Hon Ro port is only 105,000-110,000 VND/kg, equal to the price of 5 years ago. This is the reason why fishing boats for yellowfin and big-eye tuna are continuously losing money. According to fish purchasing warehouses at Hon Ro port, the reason why fish prices have not increased is because processing enterprises are facing difficulties in export output, especially affected by the "Yellow Card" of the European Commission on illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing (IUU).

Fishermen hope to be supported to go offshore

Mr. Nguyen Van Ba ​​- Head of Hon Ro Port Management Board said: “Currently, the whole province has more than 1,500 fishing vessels with a length of 15m or more specializing in offshore waters, mainly operating in trawling and fishing for yellowfin and big-eye tuna. Particularly for tuna fishing vessels, the vessels mainly dock at Hon Ro port, with a peak of about 250 fishing vessels docking at the port. However, due to low efficiency of sea trips, from the beginning of the year until now, many fishing vessels have only made 4-5 sea trips and then stayed ashore; the number of fishing vessels staying ashore in the past 3 months accounts for more than 35% of the fishing fleet specializing in docking at Hon Ro port. The risk of fishing vessels staying ashore in the coming time is even higher as the storm season is approaching, the weather is not favorable so the ship owners will not let the vessels go offshore to exploit”.

Fishing vessel operations are facing many difficulties. By the end of July 2025, the whole province recorded 178 offshore fishing vessels that had temporarily suspended their fishing vessel monitoring services, mainly due to reasons of not going to sea or financial difficulties; these vessels are currently on shore and are being closely managed by coastal localities in the province to avoid the risk of violating regulations on combating IUU fishing. Many ship owners have proposed that the State have additional support policies to accompany fishermen such as: Stabilizing the output of exploited aquatic products; supporting the cost of maintaining fishing vessel monitoring equipment; having policies to train and attract marine workers. In addition, the Government , ministries and central branches are interested in considering increasing the number of sea trips with fuel support for ship owners to reduce the cost burden. “I will try to maintain 1-2 more trips at sea. If it continues to be ineffective, I will let the ship stay ashore. If the more I go, the more losses I will lose, and I will not have the money to continue going to sea. We hope that the State will have more support policies for fishermen to go offshore, especially to stabilize the output for exploited seafood,” said Mr. Tran Ngoc Dong.

HAI LANG

Source: https://baokhanhhoa.vn/kinh-te/202508/nhieu-tau-cau-ca-ngu-dai-duong-nam-bo-40d5629/