The lockdown imposed from mid March followed by the annual fishing ban in mid-April rendered thousands of fishermen in the state jobless. But the fishing season, which commenced in the first week of June, has not brought any relief to the fishermen. Owners of mechanised boats said the prices of brown prawn are on the decline and they are incurring losses. General secretary of Dolphin Boat Operators’ Welfare Association, D Ganga Raju said marine food exporters have fixed the price of a kg brown prawn at Rs 330, which is untenable. Exporters are more focused on Indian-farmed Vannamei shrimp, which has a high demand in other states and abroad. If we get at least Rs 420 per kg for brown prawn, we will get some profits, he said. Meanwhile, seafood price is on the rise, especially popular varieties such as silver pomfret and seer fish. Traders cited low catch of the popular varieties as the reason for it. In the retail market silver pomfret or white pomfret is being sold at Rs 1,300 to Rs 1,500 per kg. Seer fish costs Rs 1,000 to Rs 1,200 a kg or even more depending on the size, D Sudhakar, a seafood lover and resident of MVP Colony told TOI. The price of both the varieties at the fishing harbour where the prices are usually lower than that at retail markets is also above Rs 1,100 and Rs 800 a kg respectively, he added. A fishing boat owner, M Naidu, told TOI that a majority of the fishing boats are returning with a catch of brown prawn (around 600 kgs a boat), whose price is dipping, while some boats are returning with low quantity of popular fishes, which is pushing up prices and driving away buyers. In this entire scenarios, we continue to lose, Naidu said.