According to Randall, a conservationist, the most successful activism requires a three-pronged approach involving science, public opinion campaigns and strategic court cases.
The eastern Pacific Ocean has historically been home to significant populations of sharks, with more than 18 different species identified in the waters of Costa Rica alone. However, many shark species are critically endangered. Over the last 60 years, global shark populations have declined by 90 per cent as a result of overfishing, which has been exacerbated during the last decades by the growing demand for shark fins, specifically to be used as the key ingredient in shark fin soup.
In China and in Chinese restaurants around the world, shark fin soup is a delicacy that was once considered a luxury consumed only on special occasions. As China’s economy booms and the growing middle class increases demand for the soup, shark finning has decimated the once-thriving stocks. As many as 100 million sharks are slaughtered annually to feed global demand. This unprecedented change in shark populations significantly threatens the sensitive balance required for healthy marine ecosystems, thus endangering the fisheries and economic livelihoods of fishing communities around the world.
The practice of shark finning has been widely criticized as wasteful by conservationists and brutal by animal rights activists. International fishing fleets targeting sharks specifically for their fins two miles of hook-covered lines, catching thousands of sharks and other marine life in what is known as long-line fishing. The sharks are then hoisted aboard, where workers slice the fins from live animals before tossing the finless bodies back into the ocean to die.
Vessels from Taiwan, China, Indonesia and elsewhere travel to shark-rich waters, pay duties to local governments to land on their docks, and then bring their catches to market in Hong Kong, where the majority of the trade in shark fins takes place.
Randall Arauz, a conservationist who founded the Association for the Restoration of Sea Turtles (PRETOMA) in 1997, has emerged as one of the world’s leading voices in the effort to ban shark finning. As a turtle biologist and conservationist, he worked with the shrimp industry in Costa Rica to reduce the sea turtle casualties associated with trawling. After some success in introducing new trawling technology to the industry, he learned that long-line fishing boats were also to blame for sea turtle deaths.
After obtaining and releasing secret footage of shark finning aboard a Costa Rican commercial fishing boat in 1997, he further exposed, in 2003, how authorities allowed the use of private docks by Taiwanese fleets engaged in shark finning. Randall then mobilized 80,000 citizens and 35 elected officials to sign a petition urging the Costa Rican government to shut them down. After a series of lawsuits, the private docks were closed to the Taiwanese fleets by presidential decree in 2010.
Randall’s grassroots work contributed to a 2005 national fisheries law prohibiting shark finning, but the law contained dangerous loopholes. When Randall realised that sharks’ lives were still at risk, he went to court to close the loopholes – and won.
In 2010, he was awarded the Goldman Environmental Prize in recognition of his commitment to advocating for critically endangered sea turtles and sharks, and for improving Costa Rica’s environmental legislation.
Today, as the shark population continues to rapidly decline, Randall has shifted his focus to halting their fishing altogether.
Randall’s work is his advocacy for sharks as key players in ocean preservation. “We have a principle here in the tropics: biodiversity fosters biodiversity,” he said. The more biodiverse an ecosystem, the more it thrives. Overfishing stifles biodiversity.
Randall used the example of a coral reef to explain the disastrous trickle-down effect of fishing sharks. When you remove sharks from a marine ecosystem, the species sharks feed on – macropredators like tunas and snappers – start reproducing more frequently. When these species inevitably overpopulate, they compete with each other and the successful species consume most of the smaller, algae-eating fish. With no fish to control the growth of algae, coral – the backbone of the entire ecosystem – suffocates.
One of Randall’s ongoing efforts is speaking out against industrial fishing. “Our fishery resources,” he explained, “aren’t made to be industrially exploited.” The sheer quantity of fish taken from the ocean isn’t the only problem; bycatch is also a chief concern.
Right now, large-scale fisheries sweep up huge numbers of endangered species—including sharks and sea turtles—during regular fishing hauls, then justify these illegal catches as bycatch. “We have to stop using the word ‘bycatch’ and start using ‘catch’ and ‘mortality’ instead,” said Randall. “‘Bycatch’ is a word the fishing industry invented to skirt blame.”
Attaining sustainability in fisheries, according to Randall, comes down to two distinct but overlapping efforts: first, reducing the volume of industrial fishing and, second, limiting fishing to specific geographic areas.
Randall currently serves as the science and policy advisor for Marine Watch International, as well as the science and policy director for the Costa Rican Centre for Restoration of Endangered Marine Species (CREMA), which protects a wide variety of endangered marine species, including sharks, manta rays, sea cucumbers, and sea turtles.
In both roles, Randall directs scientific research projects and coordinates proposed policy changes to improve environmental laws.
Randall’s latest legal battle is against the Costa Rican government, which issued a decree in 2017 stating that sharks aren’t wildlife, but rather a commercial species – meaning that they’re not protected under the wildlife conservation law.
Thanks to Randall’s tenacity and multiple legal appeals by CREMA’s team, in June 2023, the Supreme Court of Costa Rica ruled that sharks are wildlife, that declaring them a commercial species was an illegal act, and that the Costa Rican fishery institute and the Ministry of Environment must comply with the Wildlife Conservation Law.
Despite this significant legal victory, Costa Rica is ignoring the mandate – and Randall is still entrenched in an arduous legal process. His next move: persuade the Costa Rican legislative assembly to declare, formally, that sharks are wildlife, which would protect them from shark finning and other illegal practices.
Environmental advocacy is a marathon with no finish line. When Randall feels frustrated at the lack of governmental oversight or compliance, he chooses to focus on one or two high-impact areas. Lately, that’s Cocos Island, a lush volcanic island in the Pacific Ocean that is home to over a dozen shark species. “Instead of trying to save the whole Eastern Pacific Ocean, we’re focusing on combating overfishing along key migratory routes between Cocos Island and the Galapagos,” he said.
One of Randall’s current research goals is to strengthen the scientific association between highly migratory species and seamounts – underwater mountains rising from the ocean floor. To do that, he’s been deploying acoustic tracking devices and collaborating with private yachts to visit far-flung seamounts to study their unique ecosystems and the sea life they support.
“I’ve always said that the best activist is the scientist activist,” Randall reflected. Science is the starting point for environmental change, he noted. According to Randall, the most successful activism requires a three-pronged approach: science, influencing public opinion with campaigns, and strategic litigation on the ground. (Paige Smith – Goldman Environmental. Photo: Photo: Goldman Environmental Prize)
