National Plan of Action for the Conservation and Management of Sharks 2015.

The increased exploitation of sharks has raised global concerns over the sustainability of the species making them less resilient to increased fishing pressure. Recognizing the threats to shark populations worldwide, Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations developed a guideline to manage and conserve the world’s shark populations. The guideline was endorsed as the International Plan of Action on Sharks (IPOA-Sharks) by FAO’s Committee on Fisheries in 1999. IPOA-Sharks is voluntary and proposes countries engaged in either directed or non-directed exploitations of sharks to develop a National Plan of Action on the Conservation and Management of Sharks (NPOA-Sharks). 4.1 The overarching goal of the IPOA-Sharks is to ensure the conservation and management of sharks and their long-term sustainable use. Management and conservation of marine resources are given a high focus in the National Development Plans (NDP) of Maldives and the Fisheries Law itself has provisions to ensure management of all fisheries and conserve species if continued utilization could threaten the stocks. Therefore, MoFA concludes that the overarching goals of the IPOA-Sharks are in line with the fisheries management system of Maldives.
The Maldives NPOA-Sharks is a 4-year action plan comprising of actions to strengthen the current management measures and propose further actions necessary for sustainable non-extractive utilization of shark resources. NPOA-Sharks is developed by Marine Research Centre (MRC) and Fisheries Management Division (FMD) of Ministry of Fisheries and Agriculture (MoFA). NPOA-Sharks would apply to both the internal, territorial and EEZ and beyond waters of Maldives. IPOA-Sharks states three guiding principles to be used in the development of an NPOA-Sharks, as follows: i) Participation- States that contribute to fishing mortality of a species or stock should participate in its management; ii) Sustaining stocks- Management and conservation strategies should aim to keep total fishing mortality for each stock within sustainable levels by applying the precautionary approach; iii) Nutritional and socio-economic considerations- Management and conservation objectives and strategies should recognize that in some low income food-deficient regions, shark catches are a traditional and important source of food, employment and/or income. Such catches should be managed on a sustainable basis to provide a continued source of food, employment and income to local communities.
IPOA-Sharks has specifically stated objectives that NPOA-Sharks should achieve in order to achieve the overarching goal of IPOA-Sharks. The ten objectives of an NPOA-Sharks can be grouped into four broad categories; sustainability, environment, utilization and additional. Under each category, the alignment of the objectives with the fisheries management goals of Maldives will be examined. 4.3.1. Sustainability Three goals of the NPOA can be grouped under sustainability: a) Ensure that non-directed shark catches are sustainable (IPOA-Shark objective 1) b) Assess threats to shark populations (IPOA-Shark objective 2) c) Protect threatened shark populations (IPOA-Shark objective 3) Ensuring of sustainable utilization of marine resources is highly emphasized in the Maldives 7th NDP as well as the Maldives National Biodiversity Strategic Action Plan (NBSAP). Under these national plans, management plans shall be formulated in such a way that utilization is sustainable and shall use the FAO-CCRF as a basis. Maldives currently does not engage in any targeted fishery for sharks, and shark catches are now only from incidental catches in other fisheries. To ensure the incidental catches of sharks are at sustainable levels, such catches are being monitored. Regulation on Fishing and Export of Yellowfin and Bigeye Tuna has provisions to report both live and dead shark bycatch. According to the regulation, the live ones are to be released and dead ones brought onboard and declared to a fishery enforcement officer or an observer. Level of compliance with IPOA-Sharks 1) Ensure that shark catches from directed and non-directed fisheries are sustainable. 2) Assess threats to shark populations, determine and protect critical habitats and implement harvesting strategies consistent with the principles of biological sustainability and rational long-term economic use. 3) Identify and provide special attention, in particular to vulnerable or threatened shark stocks 4) Improve and develop frameworks for establishing and co-ordinating effective consultation involving all stakeholders in research, management and educational initiatives within and between States. 5) Minimise unutilised incidental catches of sharks. 6) Contribute to the protection of biodiversity and ecosystem structure and function. 7) Minimise waste and discards from shark catches in accordance with article 7.2.2.(g) of the Code of Conduct for Responsible Fisheries (for example, requiring the retention of sharks from which fins are removed). 8) Encourage full use of dead sharks. 9) Facilitate improved species-specific catch and landings data and monitoring of shark catches. 10) Facilitate the identification and reporting of species-specific biological and trade data.