By Dave Harcourt •
January 18, 2010
Three stories in the press over the last few weeks, have given South African’s unusual concerns about swimming off Cape Town’s beaches, surfing around the estuaries of Eastern Cape Rivers and canoeing in the Umgeni River.
Sharks Around Cape Town Beaches
A Zimbabwean man holidaying in Cape Town was killed, when he was attacked by what is believed to be a great white shark at Fish Hoek beach in Cape Town.
Ninety three shark attacks, 12 fatal, were reported in the Eastern and Western Cape beaches in the last 18 years compared to only 19, with one death, on KwaZulu-Natal’s beaches. The shark nets installed there have reduced attacks by 99%, since the 1960s, when attacks were a frequent occurrence. But nets are not suitable for Cape beaches because of rough seas, the presence of whales and seals and the type of sharks.
The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Shark Specialist Group (SSG), found that one third of sharks are at risk for extinction. The group analyzed 64 known species of open ocean (pelagic) sharks and rays and found that globally, 32 percent or 20 species, are considered Threatened, which includes Critically Endangered, Endangered or Vulnerable. The threat is even higher, 52 percent, for the 21 species regularly caught in high seas fisheries.
According to the most recent data estimates, roughly 70 million sharks are caught (and killed) each year, most of this is for food, some for sport, and sadly, some just out of fear.
But most of the commercially fished sharks are in fact killed for their fins only–their mutilated carcasses are simply tossed overboard. This is known as “finning”. The fins make their way into a dish known as shark fin soup–a prized delicacy in Japan but also in some Scandinavian countries and in Germany. And as its popularity increases, so do catches–and almost any shark will do (100 out of 400 species are presently exploited for food, according to the Shark Foundation). According to the IUCN (which tracks endangered species with its annual “red list“) and governmental and NGO conservation groups, one third or more of all shark species are endangered.
