i know it's considered one of the "great chinese culinary
treasures" but it is eating something to extinction and destruction
of an ecosystem...
ultimately, the people who rant about it being a "chinese custom
and tradition" will find themselves standing beside the Japanese
who insist on whaling...
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Fins for sale
Galapagos sharks are under threat due
to growing demand for £100-a-bowl soup in Chinese
restaurants
By Stephen Khan
Published: 25 June 2006
One of the world's most cherished and fragile ecosystems is
threatened by the growing popularity of a delicacy being served in
some of Britain's leading restaurants.
Elaborate soup dishes made with sharks' fins cost more than £100 a
bowl, but that has not prevented them from becoming common on the
menus of upmarket Chinese eateries.
And that could spell disaster for the delicate balance of wildlife
in the Galapagos Islands, the Pacific archipelago made famous by
Charles Darwin, who based his ground-breaking theory of evolution
on the diversity of wildlife he found there. Now, though, that
diversity is at risk.
Despite bans on the trade in fins, conservationists believe that in
the past five years the fins of more than 1.7 million sharks have
been exported from Ecuador - and the Galapagos region accounted for
more than 80 per cent of those.
(for the whole article, click here => The
Independent)
