Within the excessive seas off west Africa, a fisherman on a Chinese language longline tuna vessel cuts the fins off a stay shark earlier than throwing it again within the water to suffocate and drown.
Its profitable appendages might be landed on the port of Dakar earlier than being shipped onward to Asia to be used in shark fin soup, a delicacy in sure nations, or conventional drugs.
Finning, the observe of eradicating fins and casting the remainder of the shark overboard, usually alive, is basically prohibited throughout a wide range of regulatory zones, nations and worldwide conventions, even when fishing sure shark species is usually allowed.
But lately, unlawful shark fins have been repeatedly landed in Dakar, certainly one of Africa’s busiest fishing ports, by dozens of Chinese language and Taiwanese longline tuna vessels, in keeping with a report launched Thursday by the London-based Environmental Justice Basis NGO.
Fast inhabitants decline
Finning will increase vessels’ profitability, but in addition incentivises catching sharks, whether or not straight or as bycatch.
The observe is inherently merciless and wasteful, conservationists say, likening it to killing a rhinoceros for its horn. However brutality will not be the one downside.
International shark populations have been in fast decline as a result of industrial fishing, with a research printed within the journal Nature displaying their inhabitants has plummeted, alongside that of their shut family rays, 71% since 1970.
Additionally learn: Defined | Why are shark fisheries declining in India?
Not solely does finning additional deplete shark populations, however it usually happens in tandem with different varieties of unlawful, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing and human rights abuses.
The EJF research centered on Chinese language and Taiwanese distant water longline tuna vessels licensed to fish within the Atlantic, two of the biggest fleets of their form and conventional shark finning culprits.
Reverse engineering the state of affairs, researchers spoke with 124 Indonesian and Filipino fishers who labored on the boats between 2020 and 2025.
A complete of 71 of the 2 Atlantic fleets’ 130 vessels visited Dakar throughout that point. Based on fisher testimony, 41 of the vessels participated in shark finning.
Of these 41 vessels, 24 had landed fins in Dakar, they stated.
That quantity, EJF’s head of ocean analysis Callum Nolan stated, is probably going even “greater” on condition that the information set consists of solely express mentions from wide-ranging interviews.
Like ‘theft’
Senegal is a celebration to the Worldwide Fee for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT), which regulates fishing operations associated to tuna and tuna-like species within the Atlantic Ocean.
Not solely does ICCAT ban the retention of sure species of sharks, however it additionally specifies that fins can’t complete greater than 5 p.c of the general weight of sharks onboard. The rule is supposed to forestall finning, however makes issues troublesome to quantify.
AFP spoke with one of many Indonesian fishermen from EJF’s report, Jamaludin, at a village outdoors the coastal metropolis of Cirebon on Java island.
The 29-year-old, who goes by just one identify, labored aboard a Chinese language-flagged tuna vessel between 2018 and 2020, which he stated took way more fins aboard than our bodies with fins.
After slicing sharks “day by day”, he stated the crew unloaded fins at Dakar individually and “discreetly”.
“If there have been police, the unloading was delayed”, he stated.
Different fisherman recounted related situations to EJF, together with that fins had been usually disembarked after darkish.
“The catch was unloaded first, whereas the fins had been (unloaded) secretly… at evening” one Indonesian fisher, who labored on a Chinese language-owned longliner from 2024 to 2025, instructed the NGO, describing the operation as like “theft”.
Cheikh Ndiaye, an inspector with Senegal’s Directorate of Fisheries Safety and Surveillance, stated malfeasance was extra potential at evening when “generally there aren’t many individuals on the port” and really useful that worldwide observers monitor fishing on such boats.
Extinction potential
As apex predators, sharks regulate the ocean and are “essentially essential for the ecological integrity of our oceans”, EJF CEO Steve Trent instructed AFP.
Based on the Worldwide Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Pink Listing, 70 p.c of pelagic sharks are threatened with extinction.
In the meantime an estimated 80-101 million sharks are killed on account of fishing actions annually.
Longline tuna vessels launch a line of hooks that may stretch kilometres, catching way over simply tuna.
Greenpeace observers off West Africa in March watched one longline tuna vessel catch eight sharks in 12 hours and one other catch 32 sharks in 11 hours, the NGO instructed AFP, together with obvious finning on the second vessel, which was Spanish-flagged.
‘Actually not possible’
Disparate and difficult-to-enforce guidelines throughout fish administration zones, nations and treaties, make finning “actually not possible” to police successfully, Iris Ziegler, head of fisheries insurance policies and ocean advocacy at German marine NGO DSM, instructed AFP.
She advocates for a “fins naturally hooked up” world coverage to focus on the “particularly merciless, wasteful manner” of fishing.
The strategy, additionally advocated by EJF, would dictate fins stay on a shark’s physique upon touchdown, successfully stopping finning.
It could moreover make it simpler for port states to conduct inspections and would maintain the variety of shark deaths down.
Afterall, Ziegler stated, “if we lose the sharks, we lose our oceans”.
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