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Endangered Sharks Exploited for Liver Extract
Endangered deepwater sharks, like the gulper shark, are being systematically targeted due to the rich store of squalene in their livers. This substance is being used to make an adjuvant, a compound that boosts the body's immune response, in millions of doses of the pandemic H1N1/09 swine flu vaccine.
The World Health Organization recommends adjuvant-based vaccines, because they allow drug makers to create doses that use less of the active component, increasing available supplies. Although vaccines containing squalene have not yet been approved for use in the U.S., they are being distributed elsewhere in 26 countries so far, including Europe and Canada.
A major swine-flu vaccine producer GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), announced in October that it had orders for 440 million doses of vaccine containing adjuvant derived from shark-liver squalene.
Mary O'Malley, co-founder of the volunteer-run advocacy group Shark Safe Network, estimates that GSK's 440 million doses would require at least 9,700 pounds (4,400 kilograms) of shark oil, based on the stated squalene content of 10.69 milligrams in a dose. This estimate, however, assumes zero waste and no refining of the squalene once it's been extracted from the sharks.
Campaign against Shark Finning launched by China’s basket ball hero
Shanghai, Friday 18th December: NBA basketball star and China’s most popular figure, Yao Ming, today launched a new stage in a hard-hitting campaign to save the world’s rapidly dwindling shark population, featuring a new public service announcement (PSA) and major billboard campaign with international conservation group WildAid. Yao timed the launch to take place the day before the first game of the Shanghai Sharks basketball team, which he recently assumed control over.
The PSA shows Yao in a restaurant with a giant aquarium being offered shark fin soup. Yao looks into the aquarium and sees real footage of a live tawny nurse shark dumped on an Indonesian reef with its fins removed to supply the soup trade. Yao and his fellow diners promptly push away the soup.
“This footage is definitive proof that sharks are being finned alive for soup,” said Steve Trent, Director of WildAid. “The spiraling demand for fin to be consumed for soup, mostly in China, is having a devastating impact on shark populations across the world. Key to halting the conservation crisis now facing sharks is to kill off the demand for shark fin, and this is why the action being taken by Yao Ming, who has led a host of others to join him, is so important. The message that he will no longer eat shark fin has great impact in China.”
Fins from up to 70 million sharks a year are used for shark fin soup, often with the bodies of the animals dumped overboard dead or alive. Shark poaching is rife in marine protected areas, such as the Galapagos Islands and Cocos Island. In a recent study, the world’s top shark scientists (IUCN Shark Specialist Group) reported that of 64 species of open ocean sharks and rays 32% are ‘threatened with extinction’, primarily due to overfishing. In addition, 24% were ‘near threatened’, while another 25% could not be assessed due to lack of data. Sharks are highly vulnerable to overfishing due to their late maturity and slow reproduction. Globally, shark catches are unregulated or unsustainable. The shark fin trade is unregulated worldwide.
In China, there is growing opposition to shark finning. Yao Ming, a long-term supporter of the campaign, is joined by Chinese sporting and movie icons, as well as leading businessmen. Li Ning, who lit the Olympic torch and Liu Huan, who sang in the Beijing Olympics Opening ceremony, along with a number of gold medal Olympians, including Americans Tara Kirk and Amanda Beard, have pledged not to eat shark fin soup and have recorded public service announcements which have reached hundreds of millions of Chinese. The campaign has been featured on China’s CCTV networks featuring 20 Olympic gold medalists. Last month, 100 Chinese business leaders also joined the pledge, and the Chinese equivalent of eBay, Alibaba, stopped allowing sales of shark fin through their site.
The new Yao Ming message and billboards were supported by a grant from Sharksavers and are set for broadcast in China and around the world.
“We must urgently introduce controls and better management of sharks globally, banning trade except where it is can be proven to come from a properly-managed, sustainable fishery that prohibits the wasteful and barbaric practice of shark finning,” said Trent. “Sharks have been around for nearly 400 million years, but at the current rate of overfishing they could be wiped out in a single human generation.”
This clever little octopus has learned to compensate for the lack of an external shell: http://news. bbc.co.uk/ 1/hi/sci/ tech/8408233. stm
Kenna Eco Diving has joined forces with the SILMAR Project as local coordinators surveying coastal habitats. The SILMAR Project is one of several marine conservation activities carried out by Fundaciomar, a marine research and conservation organisation based in Begur.
Shark Alliance denounces illegal take of endangered, gentle giants
Barcelona: 16.12.09: The Shark Alliance is condemning the continued illegal take of basking sharks in Spain, evidenced this week by the display of a juvenile of the species at a supermarket fish counter in Santander. The harmless, plankton-feeding basking shark, the world’s second largest fish, is classified by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as Endangered in the Northeast Atlantic. It has been illegal for EU vessels to fish, retain or land basking sharks since 2006, yet authorities in Spain, the EU’s top shark fishing nation, are failing to enforce the regulation.
“The number of shark species protected in the EU is growing with good reason. Recovery of threatened shark species depends on tough enforcement of these rules as well as prevention of future violations through education,” said Àlex Bartolí, Shark Alliance Policy Coordinator for Spain. “In particular, all incentive to kill basking sharks, including profit or publicity, must be removed. It is high time that Spain, a global force in fishing for sharks, took conservation of these valuable yet vulnerable animals seriously.”
In February 2009, the European Commission released its Shark Plan of Action which includes commitments to educate fishermen and the public about shark conservation measures. In May 2009, two seven meter-long basking sharks were taken illegally from the waters off Valencia by one Spanish fishing vessel within the span of 24 hours.
Mr. Bartolí is the author of the 2009 Submon publication, SPAIN: A driving force in shark fishing around the world, which details poor enforcement and lack of awareness of shark protections in his country.
Brussels 15.12.09 The Shark Alliance applauds the EU Council of Fisheries Ministers’ decision to end all fishing for porbeagle sharks and reduce by 90% fishing quotas for spurdog, in line with scientific advice and proposals from the European Commission.
“These dramatic reductions in spurdog and porbeagle quotas amount to a solid performance on the first big test of the new EU Plan of Action for Sharks,” said Sonja Fordham, EU shark policy director for the Pew Environment Group and the Shark Alliance. “Ministers have acted in line with the Plan’s pledge to follow scientific advice and a precautionary approach when setting fishing limits for inherently vulnerable sharks. Ending fisheries for critically endangered porbeagle and spurdog will allow European populations to recover while enhancing the EU’s ability to promote conservation of the species on a global scale,” Fordham said.
Most sharks and rays can be easily overfished because they grow slowly, mature late and produce few young. Porbeagle and spurdog sharks are included on the IUCN Red List as Critically Endangered in the Northeast Atlantic.
The EU has proposed that porbeagle and spurdog sharks be listed under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) at the Conference of the Parties in March 2010.
Attempts to save the bluefin tuna from extinction suffered a serious set-back recently when the European Union dropped its demand for commercial fishing of the species to be banned. A rearguard action by Mediterranean fishing nations, including Spain, Italy and France, blocked moves to get the European Union to support a worldwide ban. Lobbying by Japan, whose sushi trade is heavily dependent on Europe’s bluefin exports, is thought to have played a vital role in the conservationists’ defeat.
The International Council for the Conservation of Atlantic Tuna was established in 1969 after concerns that the species was being fished unsustainably when the fish came to spawn in the Mediterranean. Between 2001 and the present, the average size of bluefin tuna has shrunk by half. In October the organisation’s scientists found that the stock was below 15 per cent of its pre-exploitation levels, qualifying it for a ban on trade via the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES).
The European Union has given out tens of millions of euros to subsidise the Mediterranean tuna fishing fleets despite warnings from scientists that overfishing is pushing the species close to extinction.Between 2000 and 2008 a total of €34.5 million (£31.4 million) was given by the EU to support the fishing fleets. Over the eight-year period, €23 million was given to fund the construction of new boats, including ultra-modern purse seiners that are able to land 100 tonnes in one haul. A further €10.5 million was given to modernise existing vessels, increasing their ability to track down and catch the tuna. Only €1 million was used to decommission vessels, but mainly for small-scale, local boats.
This shows clearly the hypocrisy of the EU, which insists on the need to conserve fish stocks while simultaneously encouraging the rapid expansion of a fleet that was already too large.
The EU has now committed to reducing overcapacity, but we’re going to have to pay again for that. We’ve paid once to make these ships that have been used to make a few people rich. They’ve destroyed the bluefin – a common stock – and now they are going to ask for more money.
THE INTERNATIONAL YEAR OF THE SHARK 2009 has ended
Threatened Sharks Listed under UN Migratory Species Convention Countries agree mako, spiny dogfish and porbeagle sharks need international attention
The Shark Alliance is heralding today’s ground-breaking agreement by more than 80 governments to list mako, spiny dogfish and porbeagle sharks under the Convention on Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS). The action is aimed at sparking the international collaboration needed to conserve populations of these wide-ranging, globally threatened sharks.
Proposals to list all the world’s populations of spiny dogfish and porbeagle sharks were developed by Belgium and advanced by the European Union (EU); Croatia proposed listing of both species of mako sharks. New Zealand, Chile and Argentina initially opposed the shark proposals. After much discussion of available information, Parties agreed to list all populations of makos and porbeagles, but only Northern hemisphere populations of spiny dogfish. Most species listed under CMS, such as bats, flamingos and dolphins, as well as basking, great white and whale sharks, are not commercially important like the shark species listed today.
Listing commercially valuable makos, spiny dogfish and porbeagles under the Convention on Migratory Species marks an important step toward expanding the tools we use to ensure shark fishing is sustainable,” said Sonja Fordham, Policy Director for the Shark Alliance. “Most sharks grow slowly, give birth to live young after lengthy pregnancies, and play important roles in marine ecosystems. It is high time they were viewed not only as commodities but also as wildlife -- deserving of attention through wildlife treaties.”
The shark species at issue are exposed to intense fishing pressure as they migrate across national boundaries and yet are not subject to international catch limits. Shortfin mako, spiny dogfish and porbeagles are among the sharks most highly prized in Europe for their meat; their fins are exported to Asia for shark fin soup. Some populations have been seriously overfished, particularly in the North Atlantic. The EU loosely regulates fishing for spiny dogfish and porbeagle and is considering dramatic quota cuts; there are no EU limits on mako shark catch.
The shark listings come under CMS Appendix II based on “unfavorable” conservation status and potential to benefit from international cooperation. Appendix II listings can elevate management priority and promote collaborative conservation initiatives throughout species’ ranges.
“We urge all countries to fulfill the intent of the listings by prioritizing the management of these imperiled shark species and actively pursuing bilateral and regional conservation agreements that include science-based limits on fishing,” added Fordham.
Many CMS conference participants will stay on in Rome for a weekend meeting to develop a landmark CMS global conservation instrument for migratory sharks. Press Release Rome 5.12.08
Octopuses Had Antarctic Ancestor - Marine Census
OSLO - Many octopuses evolved from a common ancestor that lived off Antarctica more than 30 million years ago, according to a "Census of Marine Life" that is seeking to map the oceans from microbes to whales.
Researchers in 82 nations, whose 10-year study aims to help protect life in the seas, found a mysterious meeting place for white sharks in the eastern Pacific Ocean and algae thriving at -25 degrees Celsius (-13 Fahrenheit) in the Arctic. We are approaching a picture of the oceans ... from microbes to whales," said Ron O'Dor, co-senior scientist of the census of the 2007-08 findings by up to 2,000 scientists.
The $650 million census is on track for completion in 2010, assessing about 230,000 known marine species, a statement said. It has identified 5,300 likely new species, of everything from fish or corals. So far, 110 have been confirmed as new. Among the findings, genetic evidence showed that the tentacles of the octopus family pointed to an Antarctic ancestor for many deep sea species. A modern octopus called adelieledone in Antarctica seemed the closest relative of the original. Octopuses apparently spread around the world after Antarctica became covered with a continent-wide ice sheet more than 30 million years ago, a shift that helped create oxygen-rich ocean currents flowing north, a report said. "Isolated in new habitat conditions, many different species evolved; some octopuses, for example, losing their defensive ink sacs -- pointless at perpetually dark depths," the census said.
The MarBEF book which illustrates just a few of the highlights over the last five years of MarBEF is now available as a pdf on our website http://www.marbef.org/documents/glossybook/MarBEFbooklet.pdf.
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