Attitudes and costs from a new conservation challenge
The Maldives is one of only 17 shark sanctuaries worldwide, and its hard-won conservation successes have kept it one of the most diverse regions for sharks and rays. But with success comes a new cost: shark population recoveries have brought conflict with fishers, who lose some of their catch to sharks in what is termed depredation. Maria wants to understand the economic cost of and attitudes to depredation, and how depredation impacts local opinion about sharks and the shark sanctuary. She will co-develop mitigation strategies with fishers, taking into account our warming world, and assess how engaging and empowering fishers affects their perceptions.
Mina Hatayama
Growing up in the landlocked state of Colorado in the USA, I never thought I’d feel especially connected to the ocean. Instead, I grew up roaming forests and climbing mountains. When I was 17, my high school science teacher pushed me to embrace an opportunity to join a marine conservation programme as a volunteer and learn to scuba dive. Descending into the depths of a foreign world was a daunting concept for my mountain-raised self, but never one to back down from a challenge, I went for it. From the first moment my head submerged beneath the surface,...
Are hot sharks hungry sharks? Understanding drivers and solutions for depredation amidst a changing climate
This project investigates social, ecological and physiological factors influencing shark depredation in the Maldives and aims to co-develop climate change resilient mitigation strategies with fishers.
The Maldives harbours incredible shark and ray diversity and is home to one of only 17 shark sanctuaries in the world. Unfortunately, rising concern over shark depredation threatens the long-term sustainability of shark conservation initiatives. Understanding the socio-economic factors involved in depredation is crucial for proposing effective mitigation strategies to create long-lasting and sustainable positive outcomes for shark conservation in the region, while safeguarding small-scale fisher livelihoods.
The Maldives supports a high diversity of sharks and rays, and in 2010 the Maldivian government declared all waters within the Maldives Exclusive Economic Zone a national shark sanctuary. Today, a new challenge has emerged that threatens these hard-won conservation goals: shark depredation. Simply put, shark depredation is when a shark consumes the catch off a fisher’s line before it can be retrieved, resulting in loss of income. Surveys of affected fishers have discovered that many of them believe that increasing depredation incidents are evidence of the recovery of local shark populations, directly related to the success of the shark sanctuary. Loss of income for these small-scale fishers threatens their ability to provide for their families, and so unfortunately depredation has diminished fishers’ support for the sanctuary and in some cases has led to retaliatory killings.
The two species most implicated in depredation events in the Maldives are the blacktip reef shark Carcharhinus melanopterus and the grey reef shark C. amblyrhynchos, which are listed as Vulnerable and Endangered respectively on the IUCN Red List. In addition, there aren’t enough ecological data in the region to confirm fishers’ suspicions of these species’ increasing populations. Shark depredation in the Maldives is therefore a key human–wildlife conflict that must be addressed to balance the security of small-scale fisher livelihoods with the long-term sustainability of shark and ray conservation objectives.
Meanwhile, rising temperatures in the ocean threaten to alter the metabolic requirements of many marine animals. This will invariably change the interactions between sharks and their prey, fishers and their catch and, subsequently, fishers and sharks. For this reason, shark depredation requires mitigation strategies that are flexible and inclusive of the effects of climate change. In order to achieve this, we need to understand the social, ecological and physiological factors involved in shark depredation.
- To understand the economic cost of depredation, attitudes around depredation and how depredation impacts people’s attitudes to sharks and the shark sanctuary.
- To understand shark ecology, habitat use and feeding cues, including how these change when boats are or are not present. We also aim to quantify depredation instances and assess how fisher perceptions of depredation compare with ecological observations.
- To understand how shark metabolic requirements change with water temperature and predict metabolic requirements of sharks under predicted future ocean temperatures to inform adaptable and resilient mitigation strategies.
- To co-develop mitigation strategies with fishers and assess how engaging and empowering fishers affects their perceptions of the issue.