MOTION FOR A RESOLUTION
20 February 2002
by Chris Davies, Karl-Heinz Florenz,
Dagmar Roth-Behrendt, Alexander de Roo, and Jonas Sjöstedt
on the prohibition of shark finning
B5-0031/2002
Motion for a European Parliament resolution on the prohibition of shark finning
The European Parliament,
- having regard to EU implementation of the International Plan of Action for Sharks adopted by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation in 1999:
A. Whereas sharks, which have very low reproductive rates, are being depleted at an unsustainable rate;
B. Whereas the cruel practice of "finning" - where the fins are cut off and the shark discarded - wastes up to 95% of the shark;
C. Whereas EU fishing fleets are the source of more than 25% of sharks fins entering the global market centred on Hong Kong, and the number supplied may be three times that accounted for by reported EU shark landings;
D. Whereas the governments of the USA, Brazil, Oman, South Africa and Costa Rica have banned shark finning within their territorial waters;
E. Whereas a prohibition on finning would encourage EU fishing fleets to practice full utilisation of dead sharks;
1. Calls on the European Commission to propose the prohibition of shark finning by all vessels registered to EU member states and the landing of severed shark fins at all EU ports, and the implementation of measures to comply with the UN International Plan of
Action for Sharks.