HONG Kong may have outlawed democracy and free speech, but they certainly haven’t outlawed shark fin soup, a delicacy at Chinese weddings and banquets. Near the heart of Hong Kong's luxury shopping district are a cluster of streets that specialise in traditional Chinese banquet and health foods.

Dried Seafood Street and Tonic Food Street are festooned with shop windows full of golden, dried shark and ray fins stripped of skin and bones, arranged by size and shape. Ones that are no bigger than a fist can cost a few hundred dollars per kilo. The biggest ones, like hammerhead fins, are worth thousands of dollars each and are displayed as trophies, locked in glass cases. Many of the fins come from Europe.

The EU introduced a deeply flawed law to outlaw shark-finning way back in 2003, but it was so full of loopholes the cruel practice continued, with tens of millions of sharks killed annually to meet the demand in Hong Kong, the world’s biggest consumer of shark fins. Hammerhead shark fins are among the most sought after, although fins from blue and mako sharks are important in the trade, if not always the best quality.

The fins of spurdog and other dogfish species are generally low quality, but they have been part of the international fin trade for decades and make up a substantial proportion of the exports to Asia from Europe.

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In 2008, the EU amended their shark finning regulations to enforce the protection of sharks in both EU and international waters, banning the catch of endangered sharks and rays, including angel sharks, common skates, undulate rays and white skates. But several critically endangered species in the North-East Atlantic, such as spurdog and porbeagle, were not included in these protection plans. Spain, France and the Netherlands are today involved in heavy porbeagle fishing, selling the meat to Asia where it is used in shark fin soup.

Spurdog meat, on the other hand, is sold in several European markets under enigmatic names such as saumonette in France and palombo in Italy. Schools in Belgium, Germany and France often have spurdog on their canteen lunch menus. In Germany it is known as see-aal (sea eel) and in France it is also sold as aiguillat commun.

Chip shops throughout the UK regularly sell spurdog under the pseudonym 'rock salmon', lulling the public into believing that this is some sort of common species of fish which they can safely eat with chips and not a critically endangered shark. It is sold in batter and is a white, boneless meat which is particularly popular with children.

In fact, the spurdog species is S.acanthias or spiny dogfish and is a type of shark typically caught in inshore waters around our coasts. Instead of banning all fishing for these sharks, the EU agreed to reduce the total catch levels for each species. As a result, according to the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), the EU is still responsible for more than one-fifth of the global trade in shark meat in a market said to be worth more than £2.2 billion annually.

Thankfully, as a result of Brexit and the UK’s departure from the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP), Britain will now go further than any country in the world in its efforts to save endangered sharks. Lord Goldsmith, the UK’s Ocean Minister, has announced the government’s intention to introduce legislation to ban the import and export of shark-fin products including shark-fin soup.

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Shark finning involves the horrifically cruel process of cutting the fins from a captured shark, then throwing its finless body back into the sea, where it suffers a terrible death. Announcing the intended new law, Lord Goldsmith said: “The practice is rightly banned in UK waters, but the trade continues, with serious implications for the future of these magnificent creatures. Our action will not only help boost shark numbers it will send a clear message that we do not support an industry that is forcing many species to the brink of extinction.”

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Sharks have been around for 400 million years; they were here long before the dinosaurs came and went and play a crucial role in our ocean ecosystem. But according to the International Union for Conservation and Nature (IUCN), 143 species of shark, out of over 500, are now listed as ‘under threat’, due to unsustainable fishing, where they are caught accidentally as by-catch or targeted for their fins and meat.

They have also become increasingly over-fished as a result of technological improvements in fishing and processing. Some are listed as ‘critically endangered,’ like the heavily overfished blue shark and shortfin mako. The UK is pushing for a total prohibition on catching mako in the North Atlantic high-seas fishery.

The over-exploitation of sharks in UK and European waters has reached crisis point. Some species, like the spurdog, now face extinction unless urgent action is taken to provide them with protection. Commonly found in the Irish Sea and Northeast Atlantic, they often hunt in groups, which makes them an easier target for fisheries. It is difficult for these sharks to recover from overfishing, because they are very slow to reproduce, typically having 1 litter of pups every 2 years. Female spurdog sharks have one of the longest pregnancies of any vertebrate, lasting between 18-22 months.

Unfortunately, films like Jaws have created a stigma surrounding sharks that often prevents them gaining the public attention and sympathy they deserve. They are a vital component of maintaining a balanced ecosystem in our oceans. With 39 shark and ray species now on the IUCN critically endangered Red List, the UK government’s ban on shark fin products is a welcome step in the right direction. But if we continue to allow these top predators to become top prey, we will drive many species to extinction, unbalancing the ecosystem and creating what the Smithsonian Ocean describe as a "sickly underwater swamp, filled with detritus, infested with jellyfish, and far less diverse and amazing than it is now.” Our oceans need sharks, and we must learn to love them.

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