A marine ecologist has warned about the sharp drop in the shark population in the waters of Thailand over the past decade.
About 75 of the 87 shark species in Thailand are endangered, among them the whale shark, leopard shark, hammerhead and bull shark, according to Asst Prof Thon Thamrongnawasawat, deputy dean of the Faculty of Fisheries at Kasetsart University.
Most shark species in the country’s territorial waters are listed as endangered by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (Cites), he said in a post on his Facebook page.
However, the number of sharks has dipped alarmingly over the past decade.
He cited a report from the Department of Fisheries that in 2003 sharks weighing a total of 14,409 tonnes were caught, but the figure had fallen by 90% to 1,424 in 2011. The latest records show that only 419 tonnes were caught in 2018.
Globally, about one million sharks are caught each year, 75% of them purely for the value of their fins in certain Asian cultures.
In Thailand, sharks are mostly bycatch from the coastal fishery. Nevertheless, more than 75% of them still had their fins cut, which has led to campaigns encouraging people not to eat any foods cooked from shark fins.
Asst Prof Thon said the Department of Fisheries also had a five-year national plan of action for conserving and managing sharks (2020-24) which follows advice from the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations.
The plan includes keeping records of biological data, evaluating threats posed by fisheries and the environment, training fishery employees and developing shark preservation networks.