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19 July 2010

Long Live the Shark!

Long live the shark 

by Samuela Loanakadavu

Sunday, July 18, 2010
FIJI'S Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ) is close to 1.3 million square kilometres compared to the land area of about 18,300 square kilometres.
With a population of about 850,000, more than half of our people live in rural areas - depending on land and sea for their survival.
Like most of the other parts of the Pacific, the most challenging food security towards the next 20 to 40 years is to sustain food production levels in line with food demand. In Fiji, marine lives are predominant given that we have more sea space than land. But too little has been done to protect it. EEZs are vast and the region is rich in coral reefs and marine life.
It also has unique biodiversity values.
Mangroves and coral reefs provide fish and shellfish for subsistence and commercial sale. Offshore waters provide fish for exports while coral islands and reefs support growing tourism industries.
In fact, our marine environment is under pressure from growing human populations and development.
Mismanagement of ocean resources is rife and new approaches are needed to assist communities, the private sector and national governments in sustainable development of marine resources.
Unfortunately, very few are taking their time to look into the very nature of our existence taking into account the livelihood of our children in the future.
While they enjoy their fish in meals, most are not aware of what is really happening to their food security.
The writing was on the wall in Galoa Island when I caught up with a group of man who had slaughtered 11 different sizes of two species of sharks.
I was stunned because I had never seen a large number of sharks caught in a single fishing trip in recent years.
It was also a shame to see the lack of awareness on what they were doing as their commercial need overgrew their care for the environment.
I discovered the problem was rooted in the lack of knowledge and mere ignorance.
It's a failure because there doesn't seem to be any laws against shark finning in Fiji and we probably have not considered the long term implications of the extinction of sharks.
Last year, Mike Neumann the owner of the Beqa Adventure Divers came to the fore advocating a ban on the shark fin trade. Mr Neumann believes sharks play a very important role in the survival of coral reefs which are home to other marine species.
"Sharks are keystone species, meaning they have a disproportionate effect on their environment relative to their biomass," he said.
"Such species affect many other organisms in an ecosystem and help to determine the types and numbers of various other species in a community."

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