2008 was a horrific year for commercial shark diving operations in South Africa loosing sharks to both poachers and to shark nets.We witnessed many blog posts detailing the slaughter but no real initiatives put forth to stop it. It is now 2009 and the venerable Andy Cobb has weighed in on this issue. While we do not always agree with Andy's take on things, we do agree that local conservation initiatives save sharks, but they have to start somewhere:
Shark Tourism Full Story
Shark diving in S.A is a huge International tourist attraction and the flagship species are the white shark, tiger shark, bull shark, the spotted ragged toothed shark and a whole host of varied flat sharks. Many visitors are well travelled to dive with sharks and are knowledgeable and passionate about sharks.
The white shark cage diving industry is now just a money making racket by the majority of the operators, the tourists pay large sums of money and are crammed onto a boat, to watch white sharks being fed, and breaking the S. A. law against such activity in a MPA.
