Close the loophole to stop illegal shark finning in our waters. We need laws to have “Fins Naturally Attached"

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The Hon.

Tanya

Plibersek

Minister for Environment

Dear Minister

I am disappointed that Australia has not done all it can to stamp out shark finning. Western Australia is now the only jurisdiction in Australia that does not have a ‘fins naturally attached’ (FNA) rule in any of its fisheries that harvest sharks.

Your decision to revoke the export license of Queensland’s East Coast Finfish Fishery in 2020, in part for failing to address the issue of shark finning, directly resulted in the Queensland Government implementing FNA in its east coast fishery. I thank you for this leadership, and encourage you to ensure FNA is applied in all Australian fisheries that harvest sharks.

WA’s temperate shark fishery is Australia’s second-largest dedicated shark fishery and still has no FNA rule. I understand it is currently seeking WTO reaccreditation and should it be re-accredited as a WTO, I ask that you make FNA a mandatory and time-bound rule for the fishery. FNA is globally acknowledged as a practical step that ends illegal finning and helps prevent endangered sharks entering the market.

Without their fins, sharks are very difficult to identify. If a fisher wanted to, they could cut off and keep the highly prized fins of endangered species like scalloped hammerheads and dump the bodies overboard. So long as the piles of fins and flesh on the boat appear to be in the right proportions, fisheries officers are none the wiser.

FNA will require fishers to bring sharks back to port in one piece, where the species can be identified. This data is vital to keep track of fishing activity to know if too many of any one species is being caught, and whether endangered species are being killed. This law will greatly improve fisher compliance as the current fins-to-flesh ratio is difficult to enforce.

FNA is world-best practice and Australia is lagging behind the United States, European Union, several Mediterranean countries, and India.

Minister, I ask that you ensure FNA is written into each WTO as a strict condition for any fishery that harvests sharks. It is the most immediate and practical way to guarantee Australians that our sharks are spared from the barbaric practice of live-finning, and that our fisheries are operating to world’s best practice.

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Yours sincerely,

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