The Dorsal Fin

Australia’s The 7pm Project has recently posted the following feature on declining shark populations on YouTube.

The video addresses the effects of overfishing and finning on shark populations. Unfortunately, the feature is plagued with the “magic number”, claiming 100 million sharks are killed each year, which is not backed by any solid research (research-backed estimates put the number in 26 million to 73 million range, which is staggering in its own right).

Magic numbers aside, the feature does bring up valid points, including how the media has helped to contribute to misconceptions about the dangers of sharks toward humans. Ian Gordon points out that most people know very little about shark behavior and biology. He also notes that he has been around sharks for 30 years and if sharks were as dangerous as many people believe, he would likely be dead by now.

A pirated version of Blue Sphere Media’s Unnatural Selection – Shark Finning on the Frontier video recently popped up over on YouTube. I hadn’t seen this video before, so I tracked the original down through Blue Sphere Media’s website and their Vimeo channel. The video seen below features some powerful imagery of finned sharks. From a production standpoint, the video gets an A+. Unfortunately, the video suffers from “magic number syndrome” (both the “100 million” and “90% decline” estimates make appearances in the video). The footage in the video alone is enough to make a strong message about shark finning, but when accompanied by “statistics” that have no scientific evidence behind them, the message becomes diluted. The problem of shark finning is real, as evidenced by the footage in the video, so why not use some “real” numbers (not to be confused with the real numbers you learned about in 5th grade during Mrs. Walker’s math class) to accompany this footage?

Warning: Video contains footage of discarded finned shark carcasses and severed shark fins.

The Yao Ming shark fin soup PSA produced by WildAid, reported on last week, is now online. Check out the English version of the commercial below.

WildAid has a reputation for creating some very effective PSA for animal conservation. I am really glad to see that they are using the “up to 70 million sharks” figure as opposed to the “100 million magic number.” The “up to 70 million” statistic is based on the high-end estimate from Shelley Clarke’s research on global estimates of shark catches, which estimated that between 26 million and 72 million sharks are killed commercially each year.

According to an AFP article, basketball player, Yao Ming has recently unveiled a new television commercial "aimed at wealthy Chinese" urging them to turn away from the consumption of shark fin soup. The commercial was produced by WildAid and features Ming pushing away a bowl of shark fin soup that is being offered to him in an upscale restaurant, accompanied by a narrator asking, “If you could see how shark fin is made, could you still eat it?”

Ming is quoted as saying, “We have species that need our attention and protection. They are endangered by excessive hunting by humans and deprived of habitats due to human greed.” Along with the television commercial, the basketball star’s image is also appearing on shark conservation billboard in China. Ming has been involved with WildAid in the past and made news in 2006 with his pledge to give up eating shark fin soup. Ming has also appeared in previous conservation PSAs for WildAid, including the one below which focuses on the hunting of elephants.

Hopefully, WildAid will post the new Yao Ming PSA online in the near future, as they generally do an exceptional job with their commercials (except that they tend to rely on the 100 million sharks a year “magic number”).

It seems the magic number of 100 million sharks killed each year gets quite a bit of use in the world of shark conservation, but is there any actual data to support this number? At least one commenter on this blog has called the number into question, which led met to start looking into the basis for the 100 million “statistic.” Other shark conservation-minded bloggers including Shark Diver’s Underwater Thrills and Luke Tipple have called the 100 million number into question this year, due to a lack of a scientific basis for the number. Despite the lack of any hard data to support the number it is widely used and accepted in the media and in many conservation efforts.

Research conducted by Shelley Clarke estimated the global number of sharks killed annually at 26 million to 73 million. Clarke’s Global Estimates of Shark Catches using Trade Records from Commercial Markets journal article published in 2006 in the Ecology Papers Vol 9 Issue 10 follows a generally accepted scientific methodology and is backed up by solid research.

While “26-73 million” might not roll off the tongue quite as easily as “100 million,” there is data to support the former, while there seems to be no solid data supporting the latter. Considering that I make a point of calling attention to instances of misrepresentation and misinformation in the media with this blog, I think it’s important to point out that the use of the 100 million number is not based on any specific scientific evidence, and I would encourage shark conservationists to reference the global estimates from Clarke’s research. At the end of the day, even the low-end estimate, from Clarke’s study, of 26 million is still alarming number of sharks being plucked from the ocean.

The other lesson to be learned from the lack of scientific data to back up the claim of 100 million sharks killed per year, is that opportunistic filmmakers will use the baseless number as springboard to devalue the entire shark conservation effort, as can be seen in the video below.

The gentlemen in the video have a point when it comes to the magic “100 million” number (and the “90% of the species” statistic), but nowhere in the video do you hear mention of the estimates from Clarke’s study, which would be far less disputable.

When it comes to shark conservation efforts, I recommend sticking with data that can be backed up by science. There’s already enough conjecture and flat-out misinformation out there without shark conservationists adding to it (as a couple of the people in the video above do a fine job in displaying).