Wednesday, May 15, 2013

Certified Shark Fins from the USA?

NW Atlantic fishery for Spiny Dogfish - apparently sustainable. Source.

Bingo!

You really must read this post by Chuck.
It's as clear as it gets so there's really no need to paraphrase and elaborate.
The principal statement is included in the Abstract of the underlying scientific paper and reads
Our results suggest that the species listing would provide an economic benefit for the US Northwest Atlantic fishery, and will eventually foster the conservation status of other regional stocks worldwide and the search for a more sustainable global exploitation of spiny dogfish.
Ring a bell?
The argument is very similar to what has been said with respect to the MSC certification of the Western Australian Shark fishery, i.e. that proper management including sustainable fishing of some Shark species is possible, and that instead of continuing to oppose it, we should embrace it as best practice despite of its imperfections, and those of the certification process - or even better: we should become part of the process and rectify those imperfections!

We should actively help promote a premium market for those products much like what is being done for Tuna where everybody appears to be of the opinion that it is great - and this inclusive of the fins of those sustainably caught Sharks!

But be it as it may, those Spurdog fins aren't going anywhere anytime soon.
The ever expanding network of those blanket US fin bans is blocking the exports and depriving the honest US fishermen that abide by the rules of critical income that may well be the key to their economic survival. Not good - and I must also say that I was quite appalled by some of the comments on this post delineating the stance of the US National Marine Fisheries Service!
And yes, I'm still eagerly waiting for a simple answer by the fiery José Truda Palazzo Jr.,  heroic Wikipedia page and all! :)

Don't like the certified Shark fins idea?
No worries, others do - and once again without being at liberty of getting into detail, expect some developments soon!

5 comments:

OfficetoOcean said...

I am refraining from comment until I hear from this powerhouse of conservation first...

http://internationalmarineec.homestead.com/IMEC-Homepage.html

Angelo Villagomez said...

There's 45 comments! Which one do you refer to?

Angelo Villagomez said...

And I have a funny betel nut story for you that relates to premium certified shark fin.

DaShark said...

I'm referring to some of them, like I said! :)

Betel nut huh... Micronesia... don't tell me that yer into that stuff & are going to paint Predator red next time yer here!
And anyway, what's it with you avatar all of a sudden...?

Angelo Villagomez said...

It's my Google Plus avatar from whenever I signed up for Google Plus. I haven't changed it in years. I accidentally joined google plus and blogger, which was a mistake. Google plus sucks. It screwed up my Shark Defenders profile, too.