Urge eBay &Amazon to cease the trade of ALL shark, ray, sawfish and skate by-products & shark fishin
- by: Richard Clothier@Shark Guardians
- recipient: CEOs of ebay John Donahoe and Amazon Jeff Bezos
Sharks are under serious threat of extinction.
Up to 100 million sharks are killed each year.The majority of these die for the sake of making shark fin soup, others are killed via by-catch, big game fishing, pollution, habitat destruction or for curios such as teeth, jaws, cartilage, shagreen & squalene.
More people die from injuries incurred by drink vending machines than from shark attacks!! (Rob Stewart, Shark Water)
Our campaign is to ask ebay and Amazon to prohibit the sale of ALL elasmobranchii (shark, ray, skate) by-products and to stop promoting shark fishing charters.
Many IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) listed 'vulnerable', 'near threatened' and 'endangered' shark by-products are being openly sold on eBay and Amazon.
One particular shark's jaw that is being sold is from the Ganges shark, ( Glyphis gangeticus) which is IUCN listed 'critically endangered''
But regretfully many other species' jaws, teeth, meat, liver oils, cartilage, shagreen and taxidermal products are being sold as well.
Although I have approached ebay and Amazon to ask where they stand on the issue, I have been met with stall tactics and indirect answers to direct questions.
So here we are, it's imperative we act and save sharks from extinction and we need to act now.
Sharks are integral to the survival of the planet's ecosystem. They're an asset to the planet's ecosystem, not mindless killers that eat humans wantonly.
Before you judge the helpless sharks, take a look at the destructive nature of Man first.
Setting up this petition has taken 1/2 hour, by now; nearly 6,000 sharks have already perished, so time is of the essence!!
Please help us save the sharks by signing this petition and joining Shark Guardians on Facebook & Twitter (details below).
Yours faithfully
Richard Clothier
Campaign Manager
Shark Guardians
Shark and marine conservationist
E-mail: sharkguardians@orangehome.co.uk
Facebook: www.facebook.com/SharkGuardians
Twitter: www.twitter.com/sharkguardians
Nobody can do everything, but everyone can do something ~ author unknown
Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could only do a little ~ Edmund Burke
We, the undersigned, request that Jeff Bezos & John Donahoe, CEOs of both Amazon and ebay respectively, immediately prohibit the sale and auction of all elasmobranchii by-products (elasmobranchii include sharks, skates and rays).
Millions of sharks perish every year in the name of gluttony; up to 72 million sharks are killed each year to satiate the demand in Far East Asia for shark fin soup (source: Greenpeace), but many more are slaughtered to produce curios such as jaws and teeth, cartilage, squalene (shark liver oil), shagreen (shark/ray skin) and taxidermal products for sale.
Regretfully it has come to our attention that some of your customers utilise eBay and Amazon as a platform to trade in such shark by-products, and we have all frequently come across items like teeth, jaws, taxidermal products and squalene being sold on your websites.
Sharks included on the IUCN vulnerable and endangered lists are the Great White, Mako, Thresher, Sand Tiger, Sawfish, Bull and Speartooth, and we have found by-products from all these particular species being sold openly on both eBay and Amazon.
As you can quite imagine, the sale of these by-products can only contribute to the slaughter of millions of sharks, rays and skates each year, which in turn has put 52% of shark species under the threat of extinction (source: IUCN Shark Specialist Group).
We at Shark Guardians, along with our supporters on our Facebook page & group, are appealing to you to take immediate action to cease the trade of all elasmobranchii by-products on ebay and Amazon.
We understand that to enforce protection on just the vulnerable and endangered species is difficult to manage, and that some shark species are, at present, under no immediate threat, but we are pleading for a total blanket ban on the sale and auction of any elasmobranchii by-product.
To date, ebay and Amazon have improved their policies regarding the trade of other vulnerable animal and plant by-products, but we must urgently highlight that sharks, rays and skates are also in desperate need of help, and as market leaders in the online trade market, swift and positive action on your behalf could help the recovery of the elasmobranchii species.
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