More than 180 nations gathering in Uzbekistan this week for the annual CITES conference could vote as early as Thursday on a proposal to regulate international trade in nearly 30 species of houndshark, a measure that would bring the vast majority of global shark trade under the wildlife body’s oversight. The measure would add three endangered houndsharks — the school shark (Galeorhinus galeus), common smoothhound (Mustelus mustelus) and Patagonian narrownose smoothhound (Mustelus schmitti) — as well as 26 lookalike species to CITES Appendix II, which would require countries to set up permit systems certifying that any foreign shipments of the animals are legal and sustainable. A family of about 40 small-to-medium-sized sharks known as Triakidae, houndsharks are widely consumed for their meat in southern Europe, where they’re eaten in a variety of dishes, and Australia, where they’re often the main component in fish and chips. Houndsharks can be found in restaurants in Athens, school lunches in Italy and taverns in Spain — though their meat isn’t always labeled as shark, so many people who eat it don’t realize what kind of fish it is. As bigger shark species have gradually come under CITES control, houndshark fins are increasingly turning up in Hong Kong, the world’s biggest shark fin trade hub, according to a genetic study published last year in Science Advances. “We also need to protect the small sharks,” Ralf Sonntag, marine biologist at Pro Wildlife, a German NGO, told Mongabay by phone from the Uzbek city of Samarkand, where…This article was originally published on Mongabay

From Conservation news via this RSS feed