Fisheries body fails to adopt tougher shark finning stance

Transcript

The conservation group WWF says the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission has failed to adopt a stronger ban on shark finning in the region.

Currently, shark fins are allowed to be separated at sea, but the rest of the carcass must be kept on board a vessel, and the total volume of the fins has to be five percent of the weight of bodies.

But the manager of WWF's global shark and ray initiative, Ian Campbell, says this system can be easily gamed, as it's difficult to enforce.

Ahead of the commission's meeting in Bali last week, the European Union proposed a rule that would require all fins to remain naturally attached to bodies until a vessel returns to dock.

But that proposal was blocked by several countries including Japan, South Korea, and New Zealand.

Mr  Campbell told Jamie Tahana the decision is disappointing, as the EU's proposal would have been the most effective way to ensure the region was shark finning-free zone.

IAN CAMPBELL: At the moment the Western Central Pacific Commission don't allow finning but what they do is they stated anyone who is fishing, the weight of fins should only be five percent of the weight of body. What that means is if you catch a shark incidentally you can cut the fins off at sea but you have to keep the body on board, and you have to keep the fins on board. You can keep them separately, and then when you land your catch you shouldn't have any more than five percent of the total volume of fins. So that is how the current rule is applied at the moment but unfortunately they are quite difficult to enforce.

JAMIE TAHANA: What is the problem with those rules? There was a proposal for this meeting to change them wasn't there.

IC: Yes. The scientific consensus is that five percent is not a great figure to use for all species. There is over 500 species of sharks, quite a few of them caught in the Western Central Pacific. And just taking a five percent figure doesn't really reflect accurately the species that are caught in different fisheries. In September, a vessel was boarded and it was found that the logs of the sharks caught didn't correspond to the weight of fins or the weight of carcasses on board, which kind of implied that there is some scope for foul play at sea. Of course one of the other compounding factors is that for vessels that use long lines, that's the hooks that hang off the back of the vessel, thousands and thousands of hooks, only roughly 10 percent, probably less, actually have independent observers to verify catches on board. So pretty much the bulk of the fleet is observed and very, very difficult when the catch is then landed to ensure that everyone is complying with the law.

JT: So with the current rules it's quite easy to scam the system basically?

IC: It would be very simple to bypass these rules. I mean the fins remain the most lucrative part of the shark, so that is obviously the part that certain fishing companies and skippers want to keep.

JT: And so the proposal here put forward by the European Union was to ensure that all sharks are landed with their fins naturally attached.

IC: That is correct. So the EU currently has its own set of legislation, called the common fisheries policy. And that kind of sets the rules for all the vessels in the EU, regardless of where they fish. So there was lots of debate a couple of years ago on the scientific consensus to ensure fish naturally attached is one of the best ways to ensure that finning is not happening. Because the fin is actually still attached to the carcass, there is no dispute as to those sharks corresponding to the fins that have landed.

JT: It was blocked though?

IC: Yes. There was no agreement, you know, consensus. We were sort of predicting that there would be some push back from some countries that land a lot of sharks that are keen to keep the five percent rule. Bear in mind that even the five percent rule doesn't necessarily mean it has been finning very long, but it just means a more laxed and lenient figure. So some countries wanted to keep that five percent rule and other countries wanted to back it, but of course unless there is consensus these things fall by the wayside.

JT: Why do these countries want it blocked, and this was Korea, Japan and New Zealand I see.

IC: That is correct. A lot of countries opposed the proposal for different reasons. Japan, Korea, China, Taipei, catch quite a lot of sharks. Obviously the five percent rule works for them. They also argue that storing fins attached to sharks is complicated on some of their vessels. New Zealand have a slightly different perspective. NZ last year brought in their own national policy to try and end shark finning, which is slightly more lenient in that it sets out certain fin to body ratios for certain species of sharks. And that is quite difficult to enforce in our opinion. If you are an enforcement officer you need to be able to have a degree in shark taxonomy to know what sharks species have been landed and then you need to know that all of the fins in one pile all come from the same shark. So we feel the NZ national legislation is more lenient than the fins attached, but that is not the NZ government's viewpoint. And when you start in negotiation process, lots of countries want to change the text slightly and water down the original EU proposal. And then once these things get watered down, even the countries that back them first of all like the US, like a lot of Pacific Island countries, it then becomes meaningless. So the whole process then just stalled on the last day.

JT: And that's a disappointment for you.

IC: Absolute disappointment. This is one of the main shark items and discussion. This was a big disappointment for us. Although there were a few other shark measures that passed we were happy with, the main one, the fins actually attached, which really would make sure the Western Central Pacific was a finning free zone - that one failed.