The European Union (EU) agreed this week to tighten up an existing ban on shark finning by eliminating a loophole that allowed fisherman to still remove fins from caught shark. The ban for EU fishing crews has existed since 2003, but with special permits they were still allowed to removeContinue Reading
BALTIMORE (USA)- Fishermen on the eastern US coasts catching smooth dogfish are allowed to bring back to port more than twice the ratio of fins to bodies. The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission decided to ease on the restrictions of shark finning. Conservation groups are furious and concerned that theContinue Reading
AUCKLAND (NEW ZEALAND)- Air New Zealand is the the latest airline to stop flying shipments of shark’s fin to Hong Kong, the shark’s fin capital of the world. The decision came about after the New Zealand Shark Alliance revealed the airline’s shipments in local media. Earlier, other airlines did theContinue Reading
HONG KONG (CHINA)- Air Pacific, soon to be Fiji Air, has been accused by environmentalist groups of of being one of the world’s major carriers of shark fins into Hong Kong. The airline profiles itself as ‘shark friendly’. Campaigners claim that the airline carries shark fins as cargo on its passengerContinue Reading
GUJARAT (INDIA)- Through the SharkNewz Daily I stumbled upon this shocking video on the slaughter of whale sharks off the Indian coast. It is a shortened version of the award-winning film ‘Shores of Silence’. This film moved the government of India into bringing in legislation and banning the killing of theContinue Reading
BANGKOK (Thailand)- A group of 23 luxury hotels in the Thai capital of Bangkok have pledged to ban shark fin soup. As part of a campaign to halt the decline of shark populations they signed up to a so-called “blue list”, promoting Thai hotels that don’t serve shark fin soup.Continue Reading
CAPE TOWN (SOUTH AFRICA)- The council of the South-African town of Cape Town is working on implementing new shark nets in Fish Hoek. These ones are designed to keep sharks out, rather than the conventional nets that are designed to kill them. What makes Fish Hoek’s “exclusion nets” a worldContinue Reading