RISING fuel costs and adverse weather conditions are driving up the price of fish this Easter.

The price of the protein, which is normally consumed in large amounts during the Lenten period, has gone up more than 20 per cent in recent weeks due mainly to scarcity.

Fishermen blamed the weather and also the cost to go to sea with fuel prices rising rapidly in the last few weeks due to the war in Eastern Europe. Since the start of 2022, the price of gasoline has gone up by almost $30 per litre in Jamaica. On the international market, the benchmark Brent crude futures rose by $5.43, or 4.9 per cent on Thursday to $116.57 a barrel while US West Texas Intermediate crude futures rose $4.49, or 4.1 per cent to $113.19. For fisherfolk, the increases in gasoline prices are devastating.

“Sometimes we a spend all $6,500 fi gas and come back and only make $1000 off a fish. The weather rough right now and that make it dangerous fi nuff a we… so more while it don’t even workout,,” lamented Paul Eddie, a fisherman based at the Hunt’s Bay Fishing Village in Portmore, St Catherine, told the Jamaica Observer.

Eddie also said boats are not always functional because of troubles with the engines. He said a good engine can easily cost over $1 million. He believes these expenses contribute to fewer men going out to sea to fish daily.

“Out there is kinda rough right now you know, even yesterday (Tuesday) was rough; so sometimes we have to take precaution because the sea can capsize the boat,,” added Michael Latchman, a fisherman who is also based at the Hunt’s Bay Fishing Village.

Latchman said desperation has forced him to find new fishing grounds to improve his catch. “Ano just one place me go fishing. I search, cause sometimes I’m here fishing and I hear say fish is somewhere else, so I must go,,” he said.

For the customers, the difficulties being faced by the fishermen are being manifested in the price of the protein.

“The price will increase based pon how them sell it…it’s not much more, but we might have to put on a $100 or a $150 on each pound. We used to buy all 20 pounds, but now it change cause sometimes we only can get five pound so we just have to work with it,,” Hyacinth Brown, a vendor at the Hunt’s Bay Fishing Village in Portmore, St Catherine, told the Caribbean Business Report.

She said depending on the type of fish, customers will pay up to $1000 per pound.

Fisherfolk based at the nearby New Forum Fishing Village shared similar sentiments as those from Hunt’s Bay.

Paula Hall said she is hoping for the best but added that she believes everything has just been going wrong.

“Gas fi the boat a go up so fish aguh go up too…but we keep on buying it cause at the end of the day the people them ago want it,” Hall said.

She outlined her belief that the challenges the fishing villages are facing started since COVID-19 virus was detected in Jamaica in March 2020.

“Because a corona the boats not going out like one time, even when the country a open is the same old, same old…First time even if there was a shortage in catching fish, we coulda normally import or buy from Rainforest, but all that get expensive so a more than one things,” she said.

General manager of Rainforest Seafoods Jerome Miles outlined several reasons for the shortage of fish this Easter.

“Fish are generally short this time of the year, but this year has been worse. This is mainly because of the weather. However, countries in the western Caribbean such as Suriname and Guyana are where a lot of the fish come from. But they are introducing some regulations that are affecting the supply of fish,” he said.

Suriname and Guyana — Jamaica’s main sources of imported fish — have reduced how deep their fishermen can fish and have also limited the number of days the fisherman can fish.

Miles also said the price of fish is likely to increase as the demand will attract more money, adding that the shortage of fish will only heighten the challenges.