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Shark-fin market worldwide has been shrinking since 2013, thanks to the awareness campaigns by environmental NGOs against its consumption, Kim Friedman, Senior Fishery Resource Officer, Food & Agriculture Organisation (FAO), has said.
Shark fins are one of the most expensive seafood items with a value ranging between $50-650 a kg, depending on the species. Internationally traded fins end up mostly in soups that find markets in China, Hong Kong and Singapore.
The delicacy of fins has been popular particularly in China, but a nationwide conservation campaign in that country witnessed an 80 per cent drop in consumption over recent years, Friedman said.
Friedman noted that the Chinese government and the advocacy of a Chinese basket player who campaigned on the impact of shark fin trade helped lower the consumption. In India, sharks fishing are largely for utilization of a larger range of commodities, including fresh and dried meat for local consumption.
Positive sign
“The declining market in fins is a positive sign for conservation, as sharks are a vulnerable species that needs stringent conservation measures,” he told BusinessLine . This allows marine resource managers to put more effort in managing the trade in other consumable shark products that include meat, cartilage, drug supplements, oils etc, and non consumable products like teeth, jaws, skin, and rostra, he added.
Friedman was in Kochi for the Shark Value Chain Expert Researchers meet at Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute (CMFRI).
Today, the shark fin trade is highly regulated in many countries and the efforts by NGOs have encouraged governments worldwide to list many commercially traded sharks under international controls of Convention of International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).
India, which is one of the major shark fishing nations and a signatory to CITES, has also brought in controls to ban export and import of shark fins. The government also prohibited removal of shark fins on board a vessel from the seas and calls for landing of the whole fish, he said.
However, the introduction of regulation has not always halted trade, and also resulted in rise in illegal sales of shark fins across the world. The situation would benefit from greater investment in awareness campaigns among fishermen and traders on how best to manage fishing and exports to a level that conserves the productivity of these species in the long term, he added.
Action plan
The FAO member countries have developed a response to these issues as part of an International Plan of Action for the Conservation and Management of Sharks with guidelines to nations engaged in shark fishing to participate in the conservation of shark resources in a sustainable way and minimise wastes and discards.
India has fully protected 10 shark species in addition to the fin trade ban.
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