We must get shark's fin soup off the menu
The whale shark netted in Hong Kong on Friday showed once again the poor knowledge of our administration when it comes to sharks. To cancel activities at water sports centres in Stanley for a fish that eats only plankton and shrimp reflects the huge hurdle faced by sharks whenever their name is mentioned.
The letters from Ken Chan ('End the shark scare tactics', June 3) and George Christofis ('HK has role to play in phasing out shark fin fishing', June 2), clearly underlined the tough situation for sharks. To search 10 beaches because two harmless bamboo sharks have been found was ridiculous. So education must be first enforced at the administration level and of course through children because they are the future. If this generation of children - and especially Hong Kong children - understands how important sharks are for the ocean ecosystem and that eating shark's fin soup drives them to extinction, then sharks do have a chance. If not, shark species will simply disappear from our seas one after another. There is not enough time for another generation to stand in defence of sharks. It's now or never.
For adults to comprehend is something much more complicated. Only through children do we stand a chance to get the message heard. But it is not enough to say, 'Don't eat shark's fin.' And advocating that restaurants should not have it on the menu is not a constructive attitude, either.
Alternative solutions must be found. Quotas for the industry would be a first step but it will take time and be very difficult to enforce. We must understand that, as painful as it is for shark supporters to see fins on menus, we should not forget that they are a very important part of a restaurant's income. Most restaurants are struggling with rising rents and other problems. Shark's fin soup consumption is not linked to taste (a HK$10 soup was proved a few years ago to have the same taste) nor deeply anchored in Chinese tradition. People eat shark's fin soup because it is a symbol of wealth and status. If you do not have it on the table, your guests think you have financial problems. It is a face-saving dish. So why not come up with other sustainable dishes or soups that would be even more expensive and would help restaurant owners take shark's fins off their menus? Discussing this with restaurants would be much easier with some kind of alternatives, because money still rules and conservation cannot compete if it does not take stakeholders' views into account.
Christian Pilard, founder and president, Eco-Sys Foundation
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