Twitter

News & updates

Media release: CITES Shark Listings will have Minimal Conservation Impact

NEWS & UPDATES
Share this

Bangkok, 11 March 2013 IWMC World Conservation Trust, the world’s leading independent advocate for the sustainable use of wildlife, warned today that the decision by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) to list a range of shark species in its Appendices will not produce the intended conservation outcomes.

CITES voted today to add to its Appendix II the oceanic whitetip, three species of hammerhead and the porbeagle. The shark proposals all received the required two-thirds majority of votes, albeit by small margins.

IWMC opposed the listings because international trade in fisheries is highly complex and not well-suited to the enforcement mechanisms applied more commonly by CITES to terrestrial species. This gives rise to overwhelming doubts that these new CITES listings will actually assist the species to recover, while raising concerns about the negative impacts they may have on the livelihoods of fishermen.

Eugene Lapointe, President of IWMC, said: “If recent history tells us anything, it is that the mechanisms of CITES cannot easily be adapted to promote the effective management of marine fish species. Fisheries management is best handled by regional organizations that have the tools to coordinate stock recovery efforts. CITES is deluding itself if it really believes that these listings of sharks will make any difference to stocks.”

CITES has a mixed record in aiding wildlife conservation, with some successes such as the vicuña, which was transferred from Appendix I to II at this meeting, but many disappointments, such as the tiger. It has also experienced significant problems implementing its existing listings for marine fish species, such as the humphead wrasse, which still has no agreed administrative management mechanisms in place.

IWMC believes that CITES listings of marine fish species add an unnecessary layer of complexity to the challenges of effective fisheries management. Most nations that belong to CITES also belong to regional fisheries organizations and are already in a position to establish capacity-building measures for vulnerable stocks.

View French PDF

PR-3-F-Linscription-du-requin

View Spanish PDF

PR-3-S-Shark-Listings

Related content

ASSESSMENT-REVIEW

A RESTRICTED INVITATION TO ASSESS AND EXPAND Assembled by Michelle Batterham The Problem A paper has been published reviewing various non-lethal methods currently being used,

February 11, 2021
Sharks

Hands off all sharks?

At CITES’ CoP-18 the assembled NGOs made sharks their iconic species of choice, knocking elephants off their number one spot. The question is, why did

June 10, 2021

IWMC Feature

Conservation Influencers

Conservation Influencers is a searchable directory of the animal activist, environmental and ecological lobby. It examines the history, mission, methodology and reputation of NGOs to assess their impact on the global conservation cause.

Franz Weber Foundation

From 1990 until 2015, Franz Weber Foundation (FFW) managed the Fazao-Malfakassa National Park in Togo, which was, according to an in-depth investigation by Duke University, ‘established by forcing the local communities off their land and without taking into consideration their point of view’. That same study cited convincing evidence from reports published in 1990, confirming that competition for land use was already ‘creating conflict between the local communities and park managers’. In 2015 Togo refused to renew FFW’s contract because, the report says, ‘local communities were still excluded from the management of the natural resources of their land’ and FFW had ‘failed to fulfil its contract’. Franz Weber Foundation plays a major role within CITES because it funds and manages from Switzerland the African Elephant Coalition (AEC), which represents 32 African range states, some of which have barely any elephants and others none at all. Contrary to the wishes of the range states in Southern Africa, which manage most of the world’s wild elephant populations, the AEC at CITES’ CoPs repeatedly tables proposals to put all of the world’s elephants in appendix I. And the AEC uses its voting power to keep in place prohibitions on ivory sales and all other trade in elephant-related derivatives, including skins and hair, which Southern African nations wish to legalise.

Read more...

IWMC is a not-for-profit organization incorporated in Canada with its Head Office 3, Passage de Montriond, Lausanne 1006, Switzerland. Phone: 41.21.616-5000. For more information, contact IWMC here. Twitter @iwmcwct

All rights reserved © 2022. See Terms and conditions for usage and cookies policies.

The opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by the various authors and forum participants on this web site do not necessarily reflect the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints of the IWMC World Conservation Trust or official policies of the IWMC.