Shark’s fin soup is a traditional Chinese delicacy that is popular at celebratory occasions such as the Chinese New Year, as well as a weddings. Available at many “high-class”, pricey Chinese restaurants – often as part of some 7/8-course set meal – it is considered a luxury dish and also a status symbol of sorts. If you can order shark’s fin at a meal with your friends, it shows everyone that you are rich enough to afford it. As the middle class of China expands, so has the demand for shark’s fin soup in China. The same is also happening in Singapore, which is one of the largest ports for shark’s fin trade in the world.

However, the production of shark’s fin soup is a gory, brutal story, and the subject of controversy all over the world. To get shark’s fin, sharks are trapped and caught by fishermen. Their dorsal fins are then cut off, and the still-living shark tossed back into the sea (so as not to take up valuable space on the boat).

A shark’s fin is like what arms are to humans. Without their in, they are unable to swim, and without their normal movement their gills are unable to take in oxygen. They then sink slowly to the bottom of the sea to die a slow death, or get attacked by other sea creatures.

If you go to Google Images and search “shark finning”, the photos that come up will simply break your heart. So much cruelty, death and pain, just so people can show off to their friends and family over dinner.

To make things worse, not only is shark finning animal abuse, sharks are being killed in such large numbers each year that it is having an adverse effect on the marine eco-system.

By itself, shark’s fin is tasteless. It is actually nothing much more than cartilage. The nutritional content of shark’s fin soup is not that much more than the nutritional content of a vegetable soup, and even so the nutritional value comes from the vegetables, not the fin.

Project: FIN is a Singapore-based non-profit organisation that is part of the Global Shark Initiative that hopes to increase awareness about shark finning, and to get more people to oppose the cruelty that is carried out on millions of sharks each year.

Some countries like the United States and New Zealand have put in regulations on shark finning. However, as far as I know, Singapore doesn’t have any such regulations, because we don’t really have shark finning in our seas – we are just a port for import/export. The best way, then, would be to educate the public, and make people aware of the horror of shark finning, and to get them to boycott shark’s fin soup.

A third of all animals and plants on earth face extinction — endangered blue whales, coral reefs, and a vast array of other species. The wave of human-driven extinction has reached a rate not seen since the fall of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago.

But there is a plan to save them — a global agreement to create, fund and enforce protected areas covering 20% of our seas and lands by 2020. Right now, 193 governments are meeting in Japan to address this crisis. But without public pressure, they are likely to fall short of the bold action needed to avert the collapse of ecosystems the world over.

This summit ends on Friday, October 29 — we have no time to lose. Let’s rapidly build a global public outcry urging governments to save all life on earth from runaway decline. Sign the petition below and it will be delivered directly to the meeting:

Take action now!

Here you can read the reaction to the email to the “European Parliament” (http://e-activist.com/ea-campaign/clientcampaign.do?ea.client.id=1678&ea.campaign.id=7941).

vielen Dank für Ihre Email. Sie bitten mich, anlässlich der aktuellen europäischen Haifischwoche die schriftliche Erklärung zum Schutz von Haien zu unterschreiben.

Die EU hat mit ihrer Ratsverordnung (1185/2003) aus dem Jahre 2003 ein Finning-Verbot beschlossen. Ziel dieser Verordnung des Rates ist es, die Praxis des Abtrennens von Haifischflossen an Bord von Fischereifahrzeugen und das anschließende Zurückwerfen des Tierkörpers ins Meer zu verbieten.

Das Europäische Parlament hat sich seitdem dafür eingesetzt, dass entstandene Schlupflöcher der Verordnung geschlossen werden (INI/2006/2054).

Für diese Flossen besteht offenbar immer mehr Nachfrage, insbesondere auf den asiatischen Märkten, wo sie zu hohen Preisen verkauft werden. Interessant ist in diesem Zusammenhang, dass Hawaii im Mai 2010 als erster Staat der USA den Besitz, den Handel und die Verteilung von Haifischflossen verboten hat.

Ich habe für Ihr Engagement, die offenbar immer noch bestehenden Schlupflöcher zu beseitigen, großes Verständnis. Im Fischereiausschuss des Europäischen Parlaments verfolgt meine Kollegin Britta Reimers die Entwicklung mit großer Sorge.

Sie wird sich dafür einsetzen, dass das Schicksal dieser besonderen Meeresbewohner wieder auf die Tagesordnung der Kommission gesetzt und die Ratsverordnung auch umgesetzt wird.

Wie Sie mir auf Nachfrage mitteilte, plant sie eine sogenannte Schriftliche Anfrage an die Kommission gemäß Art. 117 der Geschäftsordnung, in der sie die Kommission auffordert, die korrekte Umsetzung der Ratsverordnung zu ermöglichen und die Verordnung besser zu kontrollieren.

Diese Position teile ich und werde ebenso wie meine Kollegin das Thema weiter verfolgen.

Mit freundlichen Grüßen

Jorgo Chatzimarkakis

Remains to be seen what will happen if or whether this is a typical response of the Parliament. We will follow it!

If you have not signed yet you still have the chance here: http://e-activist.com/ea-campaign/clientcampaign.do?ea.client.id=1678&ea.campaign.id=7941

Not only in Africa (see trailer) sharks are killed, even in European waters! Now the time has come for some completely laws.

Sign petition under: www.sharkalliance.org/content.asp?did=35619

Write to your Members of the European Parliament and ask them to close the loopholes in the EU finning ban

This autumn Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) have a unique opportunity to support shark conservation and provide much needed protection for these vulnerable species. We need to persuade them to sign a Written Declaration calling on the European Commission to deliver a proposal to completely prohibit the removal of shark fins on-board vessels and finally close the loopholes in the shark finning ban.

The Written Declaration will only be effective if a large number of MEPs from all EU countries sign on. MEPs as elected representatives listen to their constituents. We need your help to encourage them to sign on.

Link to campaign: European Shark Week 2010: Focus on Finning

The European Shark Week starts tomorrow. Get ready to help us send letters to the Members of the European Parliament next week

Each year, millions of sharks are brutally maimed and killed, just for their fins. Sharks are vitally important to our waters, helping balance marine ecosystems in their role as apex predators.

The Shark Conservation Act would end shark finning in U.S. waters and make us world leaders in shark conservation.

Tell your Senators TODAY that you demand shark protections and the passage of the Shark Conservation Act.

Send this letter to your senators today

Thanks Oceana

It´s time to improve the finning ban

Every year in October the memebers of the Shark Alliance in Europe organize an actionweek für supports and all sharkfans, who want to learn more about sharks and their protection. It also offers everyone the opportunity to ask the policy makers to ensure the future wellbeing of sharks.

While the European Shark Week 2009 (ESW) there have been more then 300 events in 15 european countries organized and more than 93.000 people signed the petition, which was given to the spanish authorities in January 2010. This petition was an appeal to Spain and his opposition against an improvement of EU-finningban, so the EU can adopt efficient regulations.

More informations and pictures to the last year event under www.europeansharkweek.de
Read complete article »

Every year, up to 73 million sharks are slaughtered for their fins, meat, cartilage, liver and skin. And 30% of shark species are threatened or near threatened with extinction.

In the Bahamas, sharks bring in ecotourism and are treasured members of the ecosystem. Yet even in this tropical paradise, shark populations are depleting at an alarming rate from overfishing bycatch and shark-finning.

Two Bahamians, dive master Cristina Zenato and conservationist Pedro Baranda, have joined forces with local Bahamian and international environmental groups including “The Bahamas Humane Society”, “The Bahamas National Trust”, EARTHCARE, Friends of the Environment, The Nature Conservancy, Bahamas Reef Environment Educational Foundation (BREEF), reEarth and the Pew Environment Group to support shark conservation in the Bahamas.

Tell Bahamian authorities to enforce permanent protection for the sharks of the Bahamas before it’s too late.

Please sign the petition: Sign up

Take action on this issue

Issue summery:
Once a shining star on Ethical Traveler’s “Ethical Destinations” list, Costa Rica won acclaim for its policies promoting environmental protection, social welfare and human rights. But the popular destination was dropped from our list when it became one of the world’s main hubs for sex trafficking. Today, Costa Rica is wrestling with another menace: shark finning.

Shark finning is the act of slicing off the fin and discarding the living shark back to sea, where it dies a horrible death. The amputated fins are then exported to Asia, where they are used to make an ominous delicacy: shark fin soup (as journalist John Platt calls it, “extinction in a bowl”). Shark finning is responsible for the death of some 200 million sharks each year—contributing to a 90% decline in global shark populations.

Costa Rican native Randall Arauz (winner of a 2010 Goldman Environmental Prize) has succeeded in getting his government to pass a law forbidding shark finning, which requires that sharks be “landed” with their fins attached. Though the law doesn’t prohibit shark fishing, it slows the slaughter of sharks by limiting by the storage capacity of the offending fishing ships.

Read the complete article here.