Consumers need to stop demanding shark fin soup and other products in the absence of robust laws and sustainable practices regulating shark overfishing, research co-authored by the Sea Around Us initiative at UBC has found.
Consumers need to stop demanding shark fin soup and other products in the absence of robust laws and sustainable practices regulating shark overfishing, research co-authored by the Sea Around Us initiative at UBC has found.
The study, conducted by researchers from the University of Hong Kong, the Sea Around Us initiative at the University of British Columbia and WildAid HongKong, shows that wealthy consumers’ growing appetite for luxury items like shark fin soup has led to massive declines in populations of some shark species in recent years.
“Sea Around Us data show that shark catches amount to approximately 1.4 million tonnes per year, more than double what they were six decades ago,” said Daniel Pauly, study co-author and principal investigator with the Sea Around Us initiative at UBC’s Institute for the Oceans and Fisheries. “This overexploitation has led to almost 60 per cent of shark species being threatened, the highest proportion among all vertebrate groups.”
The study argues that the problem lies with both legal and illegal fisheries, and how challenging it is to enforce sustainable fishing practices in the high seas. The overwhelming bulk of shark fins traded globally originate from the unmanaged fisheries of less economically developed countries like Indonesia, where annual shark catches exceed 100,000 tonnes.
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Image via University of British Columbia.
