Yesterday (Sept. 18, 2026), I had the privilege of talking about how the world sees the Jeju Haenyeo, the free-diving women of Jeju Island in South Korea, at the Jeju Haenyeo Culture Forum held on Jeju Island, South Korea. If you are familiar with Netflix’s series, “When Life Gives You Tangerines,” you will understand Haenyeo womanhood, labor, sacrifice and survival.
The Haenyeo are not simply divers; they are often breadwinners whose income from abalone, seaweed and other marine resources sustained households. This tradition of fishing is recognized by Unesco as Intangible Cultural Heritage and by the FAO as a Globally Important Agricultural Heritage System.
For them, climate change is the most serious long-term threat. Warming seas lead to changing species. Changing species can lead to declining or less predictable harvests. Declining harvests affect livelihood viability. A less viable livelihood makes it harder to attract younger practitioners. And when younger people no longer enter the tradition, knowledge transmission becomes weaker. Eventually, what begins as ecological change becomes cultural loss.
But the real heritage is not merely the dive. It is the knowledge behind the dive.
It is knowing the tides, currents, winds, seasons, spawning periods and marine species. It is knowing when to harvest and when not to. It is a way of reading the sea that no textbook can fully reproduce.
The problem is that the sea they learned to read is changing.
Warming waters, shifting species, declining marine resources and increasingly unpredictable conditions are beginning to alter the ecological foundation of the Haenyeo livelihood.
This is why climate change cannot be treated as a footnote in conversations about safeguarding the Haenyeo. It is central to their future.
But I also resist the idea that the Haenyeo should be seen only as victims of climate change.
These women have observed the sea for decades. They notice changes in species, water conditions, timing, and abundance that outsiders may miss. Their memory of the marine environment is itself a valuable form of climate knowledge.
They can be more than heritage bearers. They can be climate sentinels.
The opportunity is to bring traditional ecological knowledge and modern marine science together, not to replace one with the other, but to strengthen both.
That means better climate monitoring, ecosystem restoration, fisheries management, safer working conditions, livelihood diversification, and a stronger role for Haenyeo themselves in decisions about their future.
It also means confronting the difficult question of intergenerational sustainability.
Who will dive tomorrow? It is tempting to think that the solution is simply to train younger women. But succession is more complicated than that. Young people will not continue a traditional livelihood simply because outsiders tell them that it is culturally important. The tradition needs to offer them something meaningful.
During the panel, I suggest five elements for the Haenyeo tradition to be sustainable. First, young people need to see pride and identity in the tradition. Second, there must be meaningful transfer of skills, ecological knowledge, values, and community memory. Third, the livelihood must provide dignity and reasonable economic opportunity. Fourth, young practitioners must eventually have a voice in the institutions and decisions governing the tradition. And finally, they must be able to pass not only the practice, but also its meaning, to the generation after them.
The greatest significance of the Haenyeo may not simply be their remarkable ability to dive. Their deeper significance lies in what their tradition represents: restraint, courage, women’s agency, community, ecological knowledge and respect for the sea. And this changes the way we think about heritage conservation.
We should not only ask: How do we preserve the tradition? We should ask: What conditions allow the tradition to remain alive?
That means protecting the sea. It means protecting livelihood. It means strengthening community institutions. It means creating a place for younger generations. And it means ensuring that tourism and development reinforce rather than consume the culture.
