Please sign this petition to ask the European Commission and Regional Fisheries Management to put limits on shark fishing. According to the Shark Trust, three of the world’s top 20 shark fishing nations are European (Spain, France and Portugal). Current laws allow many shark species like short fin mako to be caught in unlimited numbers. Many of these sharks aren’t caught for meat. Trawls, long lining, and gill nets catch huge numbers of sharks as target species and as bycatch. One longliner can deploy up to 200 longlines in one set–lines that contain some 3,000 hooks and stretch for 60 miles. Without placing limits on the numbers of sharks caught, these destructive fishing methods are putting more pressure on animals whose numbers are already falling rapidly. We need to support the adoption of stricter laws for catch limits in Europe to prevent a collapse of Atlantic shark populations.

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