US petition could sanction $1.5B Chinese seafood over shark finning

At a glance:

• A U.S. petition seeks sanctions on $1.5 billion in annual Chinese seafood imports
• China’s distant-water fleet engages in widespread shark finning, violating U.S. conservation standards
• Crew interviews reveal 80% admit to finning; vessels also rife with forced labor

Ecological crisis and legal trigger

Shark populations have plummeted by more than 70 percent since 1970, with over one-third of all shark and ray species now threatened with extinction. Each year, an estimated 80 million sharks are killed intentionally or as bycatch. The Center for Biological Diversity, a nonprofit focused on endangered species protection, filed a formal petition this month requesting the U.S. government potentially sanction China for failing to meet American shark conservation standards. The catalyst is the widespread, brutal practice of finning—cutting fins from live sharks and discarding the bodies, leading to a slow death—which remains rampant in China’s vast distant-water fishing fleet despite being outlawed in the U.S. since 2000.

“Losing sharks wouldn’t just be an ecological disaster; it would be a profound moral failure,” said Alex Olivera, a senior scientist at the Center for Biological Diversity. Sharks are especially vulnerable to overexploitation because they grow slowly, mature late, and produce few offspring. The petition argues that without a “fins naturally attached” landing policy—widely recognized as the only reliable way to prevent finning—China’s fleet, the largest in the world, fails to meet the requirements of the U.S. Moratorium Protection Act. Official Chinese data from 2023 alone shows over 10,000 blue sharks and nearly 1,700 shortfin mako sharks discarded in the western and central Pacific region, underscoring the scale of the issue.

Legal standards and enforcement gaps

The U.S. and more than 90 other jurisdictions require fishers to land whole sharks with fins naturally attached, a standard that eliminates guesswork and prevents the illegal disposal of bodies at sea. China, however, permits fin removal as long as the weight of fins does not exceed a certain percentage—usually 5 percent—of the shark’s total bodyweight upon landing. Conservationists argue these ratio-based regulations are biologically flawed, ignore species differences, and are nearly impossible to enforce accurately once fins are separated from bodies.

“Once the fins are separated from the bodies, inspectors have a nightmare of a time figuring out which fin belongs to which shark, whether protected species are mixed in, or if bodies were just dumped overboard,” Olivera explained. “It turns real enforcement into a math game rather than a secure chain of custody.” The petition contends this policy gap violates the Moratorium Protection Act, which mandates that nations meet U.S. conservation standards to avoid import restrictions. When asked for comment, a spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Washington stated that China is “deeply committed to science-based conservation and sustainable use of international fisheries resources” and follows international law and regional fisheries management organization rules, but declined to address the specific allegations about sharks, finning, or potential sanctions.

Human rights and environmental justice

Investigations by the Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF) in 2024 and 2026 exposed the widespread and devastating nature of China’s shark finning industry. Among crew working on Chinese distant-water vessels in the Southwest Indian Ocean, 80 percent of those interviewed reported engaging in shark finning. Sixty percent of crew onboard Chinese squid jiggers in the Southeast Pacific Ocean witnessed sharks returned to the ocean without their fins. Crew identified blue sharks, tiger sharks, pelagic threshers, and at least half a dozen other intentionally targeted species. One Indonesian fisher described the process: “When sharks got entangled, they were lifted, and the fins were cut off. Most of [the Chinese] swallowed the bone marrow right away, while the fins were sundried.” Another crew member called the act of throwing back blood-strewn but alive sharks “sadistic,” while others described hiding fin freezers to avoid international authorities.

The human toll is equally harrowing. EJF reports that Chinese distant-water vessels perpetrating finning are often rife with human rights abuses, including forced labor, crew beatings, squalid living conditions, and fatal accidents. Trapped at sea for months or years, crew members are coerced into illegally finning sharks, harpooning seals to sell fur and fangs on the black market, or catching false killer whales for souvenirs. While the Chinese Embassy stated Beijing “attaches great importance to protecting the lawful rights and interests of workers,” the testimonies reveal a grim reality where environmental destruction and human exploitation are deeply intertwined.

Trade leverage and diplomatic path

Should the National Marine Fisheries Service identify China as violating the Moratorium Protection Act, President Trump could ban imports of all $1.5 billion of Chinese seafood. The petition’s goal is not merely punishment but to “make shark conservation standards real, not optional,” as Olivera put it. China’s lack of a nationwide ban on the possession, transport, and sale of shark fin products—despite restrictions on serving shark-fin dishes at official government events—further violates U.S. law, according to the Center.

Hong Kong, a special administrative region of China, serves as the world’s largest shark fin trading hub. DNA analysis of fins imported into Hong Kong between 2014 and 2021 found at least four species listed under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species: scalloped hammerhead, smooth hammerhead, great hammerhead, and oceanic whitetip sharks. While shark finning receives significant attention, scientists like Heidy Martínez emphasize that overfishing and bycatch are the primary threats to sharks, impacting 100 percent of species. “The level of demand we place on the ocean simply cannot continue,” Martínez said, noting her first live encounter with a Great white shark in South Africa. “Shark finning is part of that larger story, a reflection of just how deeply we have exploited our oceans.” The petition seeks to use U.S. trade leverage to compel China to adopt comparable protections, turning conservation standards from optional guidelines into enforceable reality.