Shark fishing to be banned in the Maldives Copyright © Albert kok, Creative Commons Whilst some countries are quick to lead the way in shark conservation, others lag far behind and this month has seen a prime example of that. The Maldives announced that they would place a complete ban on the fishing of sharks commencing on the 1st July of this year. The ban will cover the entire area of the islands’ economic exclusion zone which covers about 35,000sq miles.The Maldives is only the second nation to introduce such a ban following on from the ban preventing all commercial fishing in a zone 230,000 sq miles around Micronesia Palau last September. The ban was made following a study by Oceana a US based group showing that 30% of all sharks are at risk of extinction with over 70 million sharks killed each year for shark fins alone- previously the Maldives principle export of sharks to China other eastern countries. The ban also makes sense on an economic scale with a recent study by the James Cook University in Australia estimating that a single Grey reef shark was worth $3,300 a year to the Maldivian tourism industry, compared with the one-time value of $32 that a fisherman would get from the same shark. At the same time the international community was making quite a different decision. As CITES overturned a proposal to control shark fisheries. Published: Nicolette Craig Monday 22 March 2010, 2:30 pm |
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