'Australia Should Lead Whale Shark Preservation'

May 12, 2005

Release from: Heather Quinlan
Sunday Times (Australia)

AUSTRALIA should take a leading role in international efforts to preserve the vulnerable whale shark species, says West Australia's environment minister.

Amid calls today for an end to commercial hunting of the world's largest fish, state Environment Minister Judy Edwards said the federal government had a responsibility to spearhead a conservation and protection program for the whale shark.

Dr Edwards was releasing an official document on behalf of delegates to the International Whale Shark Conference in Perth, asking nations throughout the world to replace harvesting of the fish with eco-tourism instead.

With a slaughtered whale shark worth $8000 or more on the Taiwanese market and some impoverished coastal communities relying on the fish for food, the challenge was to offer viable alternatives, CSIRO marine research director Dr John Keesing said.

Australia was one of 12 countries, including the US, Brazil and India, where the whale shark was protected, he said.

An average whale shark, which is non-predatory and feeds on plankton, is about 12 metres long and can weigh more than 13 tonnes.

"The whale shark's greatest asset is its enormous popularity," Dr Keesing said.

"Time and again conference papers point to the species being worth far more alive than dead."

At WA's Ningaloo Reef, where visitors scuba-dive with whale sharks, eco-tourism was valued at $12 million a year, he said.

Dr Edwards said some countries had already recognised nature-based tourism was more valuable to the economy than killing whale sharks.

"So we have a model that we believe can be appropriately adopted to local communities and we are encouraging that to be taken up," Dr Edwards told reporters.

"In Western Australia we've already identified what we believe to be a decrease in the number of whale sharks and a decline in the size of the whale shark.

"We're very worried they will just decline away unless some strong action is taken.

"The biggest fish in the ocean deserves our protection."

Dr Edwards said she would lobby Federal Environment Minister Ian Campbell, who announced the formal adoption of a whale shark recovery plan earlier this week, to take an international leadership role on the issue.