Dishing the dirt on fins

Studying sharks seems like it would be a glamorous occupation, something that Indiana Jones or Lara Croft might do in their spare time. Yet, I always find myself at smelly fishing harbours, knee-deep in semi-rotting sea life, trying to dig a shark out of a heap. 

Somehow, this is the best place for shark research in India. Research like mine, on sharks in India, is highly dependent on fishing because India fishes so many sharks. 

As the second-largest shark harvester in the world, its fishing and conservation should be more high-profile in India. However, we know very little, not only about what sharks are found in Indian waters, but also about why we catch so many of them.

In many countries, like Indonesia and Taiwan, sharks are targeted for their fins, which in turn are exported to China to make the now-infamous “Shark Fin Soup”. 

Since sharks are being valued more for their fins than anything else, fishermen began to practice a technique called shark finning, where they catch a shark, cut off and retain the fins, while throwing the rest of the body overboard, because they have no use for it. Shark finning was visible at fishing harbours where dismembered fins would be unloaded from boats, rather than the whole shark. 

Researchers, like myself and many others in India, who worked at fishing harbours, never saw such practices being adopted by Indian fishermen. We saw whole sharks because the meat was being sold in local markets. It, therefore, came as a surprise to us to learn that the Indian government had brought into force a “Fins Attached Policy”, which prohibited shark finning in India. It appeared that the government was implementing a solution to a problem that had not arisen yet.

Landing sharks whole has been a traditional practice in India, and because of this that the field of shark research was born. Research from the Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute (CMFRI), was path-breaking in using sharks caught from fisheries to identify species. 

Dr E G Silas in the 1960s began focussed studies on the biology of sharks that were caught and brought to fishing harbours, a technique that has continued to inspire the work of CMFRI scientists today. 

Says Dr K V Akhilesh, a scientist with the CMFRI: “[The fishing harbour] is an easily accessible point for information and research samples. With diverse fishing patterns and crafts used, being at a port gives an opportunity to examine the trends, composition, diversity, of multiple crafts and gears operated in different habitats/fishing grounds.” 

Dr Shobha J Kizhakudan and others led the research compiling known information about sharks in India. Their compilation of all known shark species in India is also based on research conducted at fishing harbours, where they specifically mention that sharks were brought in with fins attached i.e. the whole shark was landed. 

Akhilesh explains: “Non-extractive research like habitat monitoring, remote videos, tagging, all come with huge expenses. Lack of specific research vessels or funding for shark research in India ensures that we have to depend on sharks brought to landing sites for our data.” 

The fact that sharks are brought to fishing harbours whole and in a good enough condition to study, confirms that fishermen do not practice shark finning. 

Still, the Indian government is concerned about shark finning, since the global shark conservation community has been highlighting this issue. 

Therefore, a team of scientists, including myself, set out to understand what was driving the practice of landing sharks whole along the north-west coast of India. 

Our research, published this year in Sweden-based journal of the human environment, Ambio, used the fishing harbour as the starting point. We spoke to fishermen about where and how they caught sharks. We also used the fishing harbour as a place to locate shark traders and also watch sharks being auctioned to exporters. 

Women traders usually bought sharks to sell to the local markets for meat, while the men focussed on exports, either to the big cities of Mumbai, Mangalore and Chennai or directly out of India. 

We identified that the fact that there is a market for the meat and the existence of the fins meant that fishermen were invested in bringing the whole shark to the shore. 

In addition, most sharks were not caught intentionally. They just happened to be caught in nets set out for other species, typically their prey. It is at the fishing harbour that one can see not only what sharks are caught, but also how they are traded and used. 

By following the shark supply chains from fishing harbours to traders and exporters, we also found that large sharks appear to have severely declined in numbers. 

Fishermen seemed to be mainly catching the small sharks that were especially prized for their meat. 

These alarming trends suggest that more research is required at these fishing harbours, especially to understand long-term trends. They also suggest that conservation efforts need to focus more on domestic demands for sharks, as a matter of urgency. 

Each time that I am at a fishing harbour, getting splashed by the grey-coloured water that has just bounced off a dead fish and trying not to think about what the slippery bit of animal I must be stepping on, I remind myself of what important places these are for marine science.

Author is the first Indian woman to win the Future of Nature Award. She is the co-founder of InSeason Fish