A Burnaby woman at the forefront of the anti-shark fin movement says people need to watch what they eat, especially when it comes to seafood.
"We really need to look at what were eating, and we need to understand where food comes from and how it affects ourselves and our planet," said Burnaby's Claudia Li, co-founder of the hua foundation.
Li's comments came on the heels of a new study that found one third of the world's sharks and rays is at risk of extinction.
"We've always known the numbers we've been using, around the number of sharks being killed or harvested every year, was on the lower or more conservative side," Li told the NOW. "This problem is as bad as we thought it was. The numbers are bigger."
ELife, an online science journal, published the study on Jan. 21, and SFU biology professor Nick Dulvy was one of the researchers involved. Incidentally, Dulvy has volunteered as an advisor to Li's group, previously called Shark Truth.
While the study showed many species of sharks and rays are threatened, Dulvy could not estimate when they would become extinct if nothing changes.
"Unless we do something, those populations will keep declining," Dulvy told the NOW.
One way local people can help is by buying products marked "Ocean Wise," a consumer label for sustainably sourced seafood.
"It very often means the sustainability of those fishes includes consideration of the collateral damage of those fisheries," Dulvy said.
Sharks are often targeted for their fins, which are used in the shark fin soup, or fishermen, who are netting other species, take them in as by-catch.
"And they are valuable by-catch," Dulvy said. "Fishermen don't really go out of their way to avoid them."
