Iron hull ship or wooden hull ship?

(Baonghean) - Currently, the State is implementing a credit package of 10 trillion VND out of 16 trillion VND for fishermen to borrow to build ships to go offshore, stick to the sea and contribute to protecting national sovereignty. According to the analysis of some experts, the idea of ​​supporting fishermen to build iron ships to ensure more certainty and safety when attacked by strange ships to fish far from shore is supported by many people. However, from the actual exchange with fishermen as well as those who are knowledgeable about fishing at sea, not everyone supports the above point of view, even though most fishermen know that iron-hulled ships are better, they still prefer wooden-hulled ships. Why is that?

First of all, it must be affirmed that iron-hulled ships with equivalent or slightly larger capacity have an average construction price of 2 - 2.5 times higher than wooden-hulled ships. According to a fisherman in Quynh Lap commune (Hoang Mai town), if a newly built ship with a capacity of 750 CV only costs about 5.1 to 5.5 billion VND, with a lifespan of several decades, then an equivalent iron-hulled ship costs no less than 10 billion VND. With the above calculation, even if the fishermen are supported by loans, they still have to spend a lot of their own capital, so of course people are not interested. Besides, there are technical requirements. While wooden-hulled boats, with the current capacity of shipbuilding facilities in the province, fishermen can hold money to choose to build anywhere and regularly monitor, but for building iron-hulled boats, fishermen almost leave it to others because the construction (even annual repair and maintenance) must follow the design of factories, state-owned enterprises, joint-stock companies in Hai Phong, Da Nang or Saigon, and then hand them over.

On the other hand, according to a person who has been on a long-distance ocean-going ship (BS ship) in Quynh Long commune, Quynh Luu, said: While wooden-hulled ships only need light maintenance every year and the cost is low, iron-hulled ships are corroded by seawater and easily rusted, so they have to be maintained every year. When maintaining, we have to go to a shipbuilding facility with equipment to lift the ship out of the water, redo the whole thing and choose a good paint, so the cost is quite high, about 400 - 500 million VND/ship/year, which is beyond the capacity of fishermen. Not to mention that our steelmaking technology is not yet developed, we are not proactive in the finished product of iron hulls for shipbuilding and have to import them, so the cost is quite high. If we build with domestic steel, fishermen are not assured and the life of the ship is difficult to ensure according to the design.

In fact, our country in general and Nghe An in particular used to have a fleet of iron-hulled ocean-going ships operating in the maritime transport business, but due to ineffective operations and high annual maintenance costs, they were discontinued.

Obviously, while wooden-hulled boats with abundant raw materials and people have the right to choose the best wood (with the condition of being able to borrow money and being responsible for their loans) can fish with complete peace of mind, iron-hulled boats have certain limitations. Therefore, although fishermen are very excited to receive government support to build large-capacity boats to go offshore, the wishes of fishermen as well as the experience from the actual use of iron-hulled boats in the past are things that the authorities should study and consider carefully to avoid repeating the mistakes of previous offshore fishing project investments.

Nguyen Hai