Sunday, January 4, 2009

Florida's Softshell Turtle: a target for Asian market demand

Along with shark fins for soup and bluefin tuna for sashimi, another aquatic animal that has been impacted by Asian consumer demand is the freshwater softshell turtle. With the boom in Asian economics, the demand for this oriental delicacy (and it's use as a homeopathic medicine) has skyrocketed to the point where populations of softshell turtles in Asian countries including China, Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia have all been wiped out.

So, who is meeting this escalating demand? Sunny, fun-filled Miami. That's right, Florida is one of the leading exporters of softshell turtles, shipping them to Los Angeles or San Francisco for export overseas. One Florida seafood dealer alone processes up to 20,000 pounds a week - approximately several thousand turtles.

Federal laws that protect endangered turtle species do not extend to Florida's softshell species and while states like Texas, Oklahoma, Alabama, and Mississippi have prohibited or severely limited harvesting of these turtles, the only regulation in effect in Florida is a temporary 20-turtle-a-day limit. With the number of licensed commercial fisherman in the state that still equals an annual harvest of more than a million turtles.

The battle wages between those who seek to prohibit or limit the commercial catch and the those who support the commercial industry and their need to catch a sufficient number so as to be profitable. Once again, it's the conflict of short term economic goals vs. sensible long term environmental policy. Remember, it's only man that considers the economic impact of limiting the harvesting of a limited natural resource; Nature does not care to hear the economic arguments. It only reacts to what is being imposed upon it.

"They've been around for hundreds of millions of years and have survived climate change and lots of other things," says Jeff Miller, Center for Biological Diversity. "And now we're about to eat them out of existence - in the blink of an eye, biologically speaking."

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well I feel bad.

Katherine said...

I saw one the other day, and a passerby told me it was a "soft shell." It was very big, and making its way into the back yard of an empty house. Apparently, it has lived to a rather old age--the person telling me about it was surprised to see how big it is. I sincerely hope that it will survive, and I just can't believe this magnificent turtle is fair game. I guess money talks. I hope that the asian market does not decide that something else near and dear to the hearts of people who love nature will become their next delicacy...

Katherine said...

I am sorry that money talks and the, unless something is protected, it can be dessimated. I sincerely hope that the asian market will not "discover" anything else that it wants to eat as a special delicacy among the wildlife of Florida...