URBAN FARMER

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BY JULIO P. YAP JR.
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Global protection of thresher sharks

LOCAL government officials, coastal community representatives, environmental groups, marine scientists, resort owners, divers, and other tourism industry representatives recently gathered at the Cebu Provincial Capitol to make a global call for the protection of thresher sharks.

The groups are calling for the inclusion of thresher sharks in Appendix 2 of CITES, which would place the species under global protection and also means automatic protection in the Philippines as stipulated in the Amended Philippines Fisheries Code.

Thresher sharks are vital not only to marine ecosystems but also to tourism in coastal communities, however its populations are currently threatened by illegal fishing, trading and by-catch.

According to Dr. AA Yaptinchay, director of Marine Wildlife Watch of the Philippines, “thresher sharks are in real danger of being caught in both targeted and non-targeted fisheries as well as by-catch. It would be a global embarrassment not to support the CITES proposal for its protection, given its iconic status within the diving community in the Philippines. These sharks are clearly more valuable alive than dead.”

Monad Shoal, near the Island of Malapascua in Cebu’s Daanbantayan municipality, is the only place in the world where thresher sharks could be viewed with certainty on a daily basis.

Threshers have become the main feature of the scuba dive tourism industry in Malapascua, which accounts for most of Daanbantayan’s economy, securing the livelihood of many in the municipality and its neighboring communities.

Threshers are not just fish species that bring in tourism income.

Their presence has turned Malapascua Island into a major dive tourist attraction, helping local residents to recover after the devastation that tropical typhoon Yolanda brought in 2013.

The province of Cebu is the only local government unit in the Philippines that bans the catching, selling, possession and trading of all shark species and its derivatives.

Cebu also hosts the country’s first, and currently only, shark and ray sanctuary.

Aside from the province of Cebu, thresher sharks are also afforded local protection in Batangas City, Panglao is Bohol, and in Palawan.

Unfortunately, these are not enough, as thresher sharks could still be fished, hunted, and traded unconditionally elsewhere.

Their meat is usually consumed locally but the fins are sold internationally, for use in shark fin soup.

Sharks have long languished from misinformation and the bad reputation they received from thriller monster movies.

“But they are vital to marine ecosystems. Their protection under CITES also means that Threshers will automatically be protected under Section 102 of the Implementing Rules and Regulations of the Amended Philippine Fisheries, until such time a scientific study allows it to be traded under strong monitoring and regulation,” said Vince Cinches, Philippines Oceans Campaigner of Greenpeace Southeast Asia./PN
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