Piscine plunder

摘要

ON MAY 4TH customs officials in Hong Kong impounded the largest illegal haul of shark fins in the territory's history. The documents declared the cargo to be dried fish, but they were in Spanish, not English, which aroused suspicions. Officials found 24 tonnes of fins, most from endangered species such as thresher sharks, with a retail value of $1.1m. They came from Ecuador. Ecuador portrays itself as a victim of illegal, unregulated and unreported (IUU) fishing by Chinese trawlers near the Galapagos islands. In fact, its fishing industry is just as bad, says Max Bello of Mission Blue, an ngo based in California. Ecuadorean vessels fish illegally in protected areas such as Colombia's Malpelo sanctuary and Costa Rica's Cocos island. Since 2018 at least 136 large Ecuadorean fishing vessels have entered the Galapagos islands' reserve, which covers 133,000 square km (51,000 square miles), says the director of the archipelago's national park.