By Doreen Ampofo.
The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), has called on world leaders to intensify the crack down on illegal fishing and enforce sustainable fishing quotas. This is due to research that has shown that there is growing pressure on marine species which is fast leading to the extinction of some marine animals.
According to the IUCN’s latest list of endangered species presented at the World Conservation Congress in Marseille, the existence of 38 thousand marine species are threatened with 902 already extinct. It also shows that 37% of the world’s sharks and rays are currently threatened with extinction and this will severely affect the marine ecosystem and fish production in the ocean. All of the threatened shark and ray species are overfished, with 31% further affected by loss and degradation of habitat and 10% affected by climate change.
The IUCN says the situation demonstrates that effective management measures are lacking throughout much of the world’s oceans.
On the other hand, the report showed that commercially-fished tuna species are on the path to recovery due to the enforcement of regional fishing quotas over the last decade. The Atlantic Bluefin tuna (Thunnus thynnus) moved from Endangered to Least Concern while the Southern Bluefin tuna (Thunnus maccoyii) moved from Critically Endangered to Endangered. The albacore (Thunnus alalunga) and yellowfin tunas (Thunnus albacares) both moved from Near Threatened to Least Concern.
Despite global improvement at the species level, many regional tuna stocks remain severely depleted. While the larger, eastern population of Atlantic Bluefin tuna, which originates in the Mediterranean, has increased by at least 22% over the last four decades, the species’ smaller native western Atlantic population, which spawns in the Gulf of Mexico, has declined by more than half in the same period. The yellowfin tuna meanwhile continues to be overfished in the Indian Ocean.
