By Ramesh Mathew/Staff Reporter

Strong winds blowing along the country’s coast have hit fishing activities hard, with supplies to the main market falling considerably in the past few days, it is learnt.
Sources in the industry have told Gulf Times that shortage in the supply has contributed to a rise in the prices of some sought-after varieties of fish in the local market. This has come at a time when their demand is going up slowly, they add.
While the wholesale price of varieties such as King Fish (Chenad) and Hamour have gone up by more than 100%, some others too have become dearer over the past couple of days.
Hamour, which was available for QR25-27 a kilo a few days ago, was being traded at QR54 a kilo (wholesale) yesterday. Chenad was being sold for QR50-52 a kilo as compared to QR20-25 in the previous week.
Even the usually cheaper sardines have become expensive in the last 48 hours, with the wholesale price being QR6 a kilo yesterday.
While acknowledging that the demand for varieties such as Chenad and Hamour has shot up in the second half of Ramadan, traders say they did not expect prices to reach the present levels in such a short period. Some of the major wholesalers said while there was an increasing demand these days, they were unable to provide supplies to regular customers - mainly hotels and restaurants - because of the shortage in the market.
It was found that only a few boat operators were out on duty owing to unfamiliar climatic conditions and the availability of fish was unlikely to improve in the next few days. “The weather has not been good for the past few days and many of us are remaining indoors,” said a senior fisherman at Wakrah.
Traders said unless supplies to the market returned to normal, there was hardly any chance of prices falling from the present levels. Sources said the windy conditions were expected to ease only after 4-5 days and no large-scale fishing would be possible until at least August 4.