[Anchor]

Due to the heatwave, the prices of seafood, including flounder, are skyrocketing.

Consequently, the worries of fishermen are also increasing.

As the sea water is warming up faster than last year, fishermen are truly in a state of emergency.

Min So-young reports.

[Report]

Every year around this time, the port bustling with silver hairtail fishing boats is now lined with docked vessels.

As the high temperatures cause the hairtail to disappear from the waters off Jeju, boats that set out are unable to even cover their fuel costs, leading some to abandon fishing altogether.

[Oh Jong-sil/Chairman of Seongsanpo Fishing Boat Owners Association: "The hairtail (fishing grounds) are not forming at all, so we are sad not to be able to set out. We need to stir things up for the fish to come up and for the water temperature to drop...."]

This fish farm is reluctantly shipping out flounder that haven't even fully grown.

After a record heatwave last year caused the death of 30 tons of flounder, they have decided to change direction and ship early this year.

[Kim Il-hwan/Flounder farmer: "The losses are enormous. We need to grow them over 1 kg to receive a normal price. It might be better to sell them now than to lose them to high temperatures."]

With the early heatwave, a high-temperature warning was issued in the waters off Jeju 15 days earlier than last year on the 9th.

In Jeju's fish farms, damages from high temperatures recorded 5.3 billion won last year, which has increased more than 30 times in four years.

As the sea temperature rises, they need to supply liquefied oxygen, but this is a heavy burden for the fishermen.

[Oh Dong-hoon/Executive Director of Jeju Fisheries Cooperative: "The monthly costs exceeding 10 million won make economic management very difficult for these fishermen."]

With the early onset of the heatwave, concerns are growing that the damage from high temperatures will increase, causing fishermen to be increasingly anxious.

KBS News Min So-young.

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