The haenyeo (fishing style of Jeju Island) is one of the newest additions to the Globally Important Agricultural Heritage System of the United Nations agency Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), a designation received at the FAO's general assembly from Nov. 8-10 in Rome. Shown are female divers on the island doing muljil (diving activity). (Jeju Special Self-Governing Province)
By Lee Dasom
Jeju Island's haenyeo, or the unique fishing practices of the region's female divers, has been added to the Globally Important Agricultural Heritage System (GIAHS) of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).
Jeju Special Self-Governing Province on Nov. 13 said the FAO made the designation at its general assembly from Nov. 8-10 in Rome.
The so-called Haenyeo Fisheries System as named by the FAO involves female divers going 10 m into the sea without any underwater breathing equipment to catch seafood such as disk abalone, turban shells and seaweed. It was designated National Important Fishery Heritage No. 1 in 2015, UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2016 and National Intangible Cultural Property by the Cultural Heritage Administration in 2017.
The FAO described haenyeo as a "traditional subsistence fishery" and "community-based culture centered on women."
Korea thus has seven designations in the GIAHS. The other six are the batdam agricultural system in Jeju and traditional gudeljang irrigated rice terraces on Cheongsando Island in Wando-gun County, Jeollanam-do Province (2014); traditional Hadong tea agrosystem in Hadong-gun County, Gyeongsangnam-do Province (2017); Geumsan traditional ginseng agricultural system in Geumsan-gun County, Chungcheongnam-do Province (2018); Damyang bamboo field agricultural system in Damyang-gun County, Jeollanam-do (2020); and the hand net fishery system for march clams on the Seomjingang River in Hadong-gun and Gwangyang, Jeollanam-do (2023).
Including the haenyeo, the FAO in its general assembly named eight items to the GIAHS list from five countries: pasture system in Andorra, chestnut, white ginger and waxberry heartlands in China, hay milk in Austria, and flood-spreading gardens and walnut cultivation in Iran.
Launched in 2002 by the FAO, GIAHS seeks to preserve and pass down traditional agricultural activities, landscapes, biodiversity and land-use systems around the world.