Environmental groups are welcoming a joint effort by the European Parliament and Fisheries Commissioner Maria Damanaki to close loopholes in an EU shark-finning ban that they see as among the weakest in the world.
The cruel practice of slicing off a shark’s fins and discarding the carcass at sea – the fish sometimes staying alive on the ocean bottom for months unable to move – stems for a growing demand, particularly in Asia, for shark-fin soup.
Members of the European Parliament last September launched an initiative to strengthen the EU rules on finning, an imitative that gathered strong support from Commissioner Damanaki, who said she would soon open public consultations on a new set of laws, to be followed by a Commission proposal in July next year.
“In the meantime I will push for introducing quotas for a number of shark species fished in international waters”, she added.
The consultation, scheduled to take six weeks, was launched in mid-November, including a rule that requires that fins remain naturally attached to shark bodies until fishing vessels return to port.
Loopholes in the current EU regulation, adopted in 2003, make it possible for fishermen to fin an estimated two of three sharks without detection or punishment.
“For too long, the EU has left the door open to shark finning,” said Uta Bellion, director of the Pew Environment Group’s European Marine Programme and European coordinator of the Shark Alliance. “This consultation could result in a substantial policy improvement, particularly if the one truly reliable option for preventing finning—a complete prohibition on the removal of shark fins at sea—is adopted.”
Most scientists agree that requiring sharks to be landed with their fins still naturally attached to their bodies is by far the best method for implementing finning bans. Not only will this policy result in vastly improved enforcement, but it will also allow for better species-specific catch data collection, which is vital for the assessment and management of shark populations.
DNA testing can now make it possible to trace shark fins on sale back to the region where the fish originated.