Nice!
This is an excellent opinion piece,
Jason Y Ng brings a cultural but also human perspective that none of us in the West ever could - and that's why his article is both so authentic and compelling.
Well said!
And here is another excellent one.
It may highlight another aspect of the global debate - but actually, the topic is one of the same: way too many Sharks are being killed, and way too many of the fins that are being traded originate from badly or not managed, unsustainable fisheries and have been obtained by unethical and illegal means.
Now of course that's not the full story.
There are a few relatively well managed Shark fisheries operating with sustainable quotas and where the entire animals are being landed and utilized - and from a conservation point of view, there are no valid reasons whereby the fins from those Sharks should not be consumed but rather thrown away. But once they are processed and being sold to the consumers, those legit fins are unrecognizable from the others - and as long as that is the case, the fin trade must be opposed and the soup must stay off the menu.
So it's back to square one.
If the embattled trade wants to survive, it must reform and become transparent. Developments like this and this are certainly pointing in the right direction - and let me reiterate that we in the conservation movement should not oppose but instead facilitate them. If the trade itself would be pushing for sustainability, it would undoubtedly quickly lead to huge improvements on the ground, this very much like anywhere else the trade has been forced to clean up its act.
Are they gonna be clever and do so?
We shall see shall we not!
3 comments:
Right. Boris Worm: Animal Welfare Watchdog.
Now that I finally understand your comment.
I can't believe I'm saying this - but maybe yer a tad intransigent here?
The dude is clearly not claiming to be a Shark specialist - and with that in mind, his info is remarkably accurate, no?
Finning is of course an issue that straddles the divide between conservation and animal welfare. So he may be forgiven for the sacrilege, the more as so many professed conservation causes and orgs are not about conservation but welfare.
Re the scientific debate.
There is obviously no debate whatsoever among (reputable!) scholars and scientists about the fact that many sharks are endangered.
But finning is not the cause per se - the principal cause is overfishing.
And the risk of extinction has indeed been grossly overstated, see the inflated numbers and e.g. the persistent meme that all Sharks will go extinct by 2020 that continue to be spouted by some of the Shark activists - hence my fury when dealing with the latter and my tolerance here!
Long story short, if a foodie bonvivant feels compelled to write an eloquent piece against the soup, all the power to him!
And.
The man is a lawyer - how can I not like him!
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