CITES: Global Trade in Shark Fins Regulated

In response to the alarming decline in global shark populations, a group of countries from around the world has today announced a landmark initiative to curb the unsustainable global trade in shark fins, which threatens to push these ecologically important predators to the brink of extinction.

The Government of Panama is leading this initiative in partnership with 40 countries from around the world, joined by the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Colombia, El Salvador, the Seychelles, the Maldives, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Senegal, Gabon, Israel, the United Kingdom, Syria, and the European Union and its member states (27 countries). The decisions will be taken at the 19th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).

Panama is hosting the CITES meeting in November, at which 184 member states will convene to decide on the regulation of international trade in the world's most threatened species. Panama itself proposes that CITES regulate trade in all requiem sharks — a family that includes the endangered Grey Reef Shark, popular with divers around the world, as well as species such as the Blacktip Shark and the Ganges Shark, which have been pushed even closer to the brink of extinction by overfishing and the fin trade. Further proposals aim to ensure similar protective measures for coastal hammerhead sharks and guitarfish — the flattened relatives of true sharks.

It is encouraging to see CITES governments matching their ambition to the scale of the threat facing sharks and rays worldwide. With these three proposals, we will move from approximately 25% of species found in the fin trade being regulated under CITES to a situation where the vast majority of sharks whose fins are traded in a market worth half a billion dollars per year will be subject to CITES oversight and control.

Luke Warwick, Director of Shark and Ray Conservation at the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS).

Recently published scientific studies have demonstrated how urgently this action is needed: 37% of all sharks (and their close relatives, the rays) and 70% of species traded for their fins are already threatened with extinction – the second highest rate of threatened species of any animal group on the planet. Many requiem sharks are important predators in the world's coral reefs. However, recent global surveys found that they are functionally extinct in 20% of the reefs studied, further jeopardizing the health of these ecosystems, which are already being devastated by climate change.

«If these listings are adopted, they would change the face of shark conservation and lead to adequate protection and sustainable management for species that have largely been overlooked until now», said Megan O’Toole, Director of International Policy at IFAW. «Panama and its partner governments are offering a clear path for the survival of these species. We hope the rest of the world agrees and gives sharks the long-overdue attention that this listing brings.«

The CITES Conference of the Parties will make its final decision on these shark conservation measures at its meeting from 14 to 25 November in Panama City, Panama. This is the fourth CITES Conference of the Parties to be held in Central and South America and the Caribbean since CITES entered into force on 1 July 1975, the first in Central America since 1979, and the first in the entire region since 2002.