Impact of policies on the conservation of sharks in the large pelagic fisheries

Sharks are of great commercial importance in the marine fisheries sector in Sri Lanka. They are taken in large quantities for human consumption, especially to obtain shark fins, which is an export oriented product and to a lesser extent for the extraction of liver oil. Though pelagic shark catches are incidental to or a by-catch of fisheries mainly targeting tuna in Sri Lanka, sharks are mostly harvested for their fins.
The annual shark production has been estimated at 4392, 3177, 1828 and 1611MT respectively in 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014. A considerable declining trend of shark landings has been observed during the last two years mainly due to strong implementation of new regulations on sharks and strengthening of legal provisions mainly focusing on conservation of Thresher shark. Further, the declining price of shark fins made fishermen gradually divert to export oriented tuna fishery.
Past research has reported 60 species of sharks. However, present composition is limited to 48 species. The present catch is dominated by Silky shark, which has remained dominant over the past decade.
The regulation on the total banning of thresher shark (Gazette No. 1768/36 dated 27-07-2012) made noticeable impact on shark landing as a whole. This may be the major result of shark landings in the past 2 years. Sri Lanka’s National Plan of Action for the conservation and management has also made fishermen aware of national policy for shark conservation. In 2014, the annual Pelagic Shark by-catch has been less than 2% of the total large pelagic production in the country.