As another frantic year comes to an end, the PADI AWARE team have numerous reasons to head into the holiday season full of good cheer on a successful 2022 as well as optimism for 2023. The year started out with PADI AWARE being invited to present the conservation efforts of the recreational diving sector at the United Nations Our Ocean Conference in Palau, where we were able to showcase incredible efforts by the PADI community in Brazil, South Africa, Fiji and Vanuatu who are leading local efforts on shark conservation and the development of innovative marine protected areas (MPAs) as well groundbreaking work in partnering with local governments in the Dominican Republic and Malaysia on tackling marine debris. Throughout the year we helped set up local community conservation projects through our new small grant program, and 2022 culminated in some amazing progress for shark conservation at the CITES meeting in November.

If I focused this blog on everything we have worked on this year, I would be still be writing now and would probably be in the running for the longest blog in history, so I will be focussing on the CITES campaign because everyone who is reading this will have played some part in helping us achieve our goals. For those of you who may not have been following our CITES campaign progress (you’d better have a good excuse lined up if you haven’t), a quick summary refresher. CITES is a global agreement on international trade in endangered species of animals and plants. There are 184 countries signed up to the agreement, and they meet every three years to discuss plans to add (or remove) species from the agreement. In November, the 19th CITES meeting was held in Panama, and the host government, supported by 40 other countries, put forward a proposal to list all species of requiem sharks. This proposal covered 54 species ranging from reef sharks to bull sharks to lemon sharks. They also backed a proposal to list 6 species of small-bodied hammerhead sharks along with the EU, Brazil, Ecuador and Colombia. The requiem shark proposal was contentious as it also included blue sharks, a species that is highly lucrative in large-scale industrial fisheries.

PADI AWARE is a registered observer at CITES, and, supported by the fantastic PADI Regional Manager for Latin America, Julio Salvatori, we were invited by the government of Panama and the co-proposal governments to provide information on the value of sharks to the recreational diving sector and to the economics of eco-tourism. With our expertise and insider knowledge, we were able to provide compelling reasons for increased shark protection measures, which will not only help in reef conservation and the survival of threatened shark populations, but also in providing jobs and opportunities for vulnerable coastal communities worldwide.

We were helped out by our fantastic community of supporters, people like you, who signed our CITES petition, or from PADI operators who added their voice to letters from businesses who benefit from marine conservation. The diving sector’s ability to generate income either via attracting tourists or paying tax revenue, coupled with the employment opportunities in regenerative tourism activities was a major talking point around the CITES shark discussions, and this evidence and information was presented front and centre to governments who were yet to decide whether to support the CITES measure or not. When the shark proposals were up for initial discussions, we entered into 3 hours of debates and arguments on the merits of protecting, or not protecting, the sharks on CITES. The main area of disagreement was on the burdens that would be put on countries that imported or exported a lot of sharks as they would need to ensure any shark parts, including fins, that went into international trade, have certified permits to ensure populations remained healthy.

After the, at times, heated discussions, the proposal was put to a vote where countries would decide whether to put the sharks forward for protection under CITES. PADI AWARE had been working with a large coalition of other NGOs on the shark issue, and we had all been striving to ensure that there was the required 66% support from the attending countries. Many hours of advocacy and advice had been undertaken over years, not just at the meeting, to convince governments of the dire situation facing many of the world’s shark species, and a CITES listing would be a step in the right direction. Governments are given 40 seconds to vote (this vote was in secret) on whether to support or oppose the shark proposal, and I can confirm that 40 seconds is a very long time when it is the culmination of days, months and in some cases years of campaign work. When the vote outcome was revealed showing the shark proposal had gained 75% support, and would be recommended for inclusion under CITES, a spontaneous round of applause broke out in the room, and included the AWARE team. This wasn’t really following the etiquette rules of this high-level meeting, but the palpable sense of relief was overwhelming. While this was a huge moment, it was not the end of the story as the proposals still had to receive final approval at the end of the following week.

The next week was spent shoring up the evidence for shark protection, with multiple events and seminars setting out the case for protection in the hope of the proposal not being “reopened for debate”, which means that any country can request to discuss the shark proposals again in order to try to overturn the original support. Despite Japan registering their concern over the proposal, it was approved with a request for countries to have 12 months to prepare themselves for the added measures they needed to take to implement the trade restrictions.

As we were celebrating the decision in Panama, our Shark League coalition colleagues were busy fighting to get more fishery conservation measures in place in the South Atlantic to protect mako sharks. We were so happy when our partners informed us that their campaign was successful. A double win for shark conservation. Can we start to whisper it? Is shark conservation starting to make ground?

2023 promises to build on these fantastic results and help ensure we meet our goals under our Blueprint for Ocean Action, and every one of you who took any local action, from generous donations to organizing campaigns in your backyard to spreading the AWARE word to your networks, we thank you all for being Torchbearers for global ocean action.

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