Traditional Medicine Trade: Sturgeon Endangered Species Handbook

Trade

Traditional Medicine Trade: Sturgeon

Caviar, the eggs of sturgeon of many species and several other species of fish, is considered a great delicacy by gourmet diners around the world. The killing of sturgeon for the most valuable types of caviar has pushed many species of these ancient fish close to extinction. Caviar is the most valuable of all fisheries products. Prime Beluga caviar from Russia sells for as much as $80 per ounce ($1,280 per pound), and Iranian Beluga for $125 an ounce ($2,000 per pound) (Fabricant 2000). Beluga sturgeon (Huso huso) breed in the Volga River and spend their lives in the Caspian Sea, which is bordered by Russia, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan and Iran. Two other species native to the Caspian, Russian Sturgeon (Acipenser gueldenstaedti) and the Sevruga or Stellate Sturgeon (Acipenser stellatus), have also declined to endangered status. Prior to the overfishing, damming of their spawning river and pollution of the Caspian by industry, pesticides and offshore oil rigs, these sturgeon were abundant and reached great lengths and weights (Tyler 2000). A Beluga caught in 1926 was estimated to be 75 years old, weighed 2,000 pounds and yielded 396 pounds of caviar (Sparks 1992). Even larger individuals weighing 2,500 pounds and measuring up to 28 feet in length have been reported (Sparks 1992). As recently as the 1970s, Beluga at least 60 years old were regularly caught (Platt 1995). Today, few giant sturgeon remain anywhere in the world. Ninety percent of Caspian Sea sturgeon are killed before they are mature enough to reproduce; the typical adult is now less than 18 years old and weighs only about 77 pounds (Platt 1995).

Sturgeon of the Caspian Sea produce 95 percent of black caviar, the most sought-after of all caviar. Their decline began with the construction of large dams on the Volga River which disrupted their migration to spawn. Fewer and fewer sturgeon are able to negotiate this river and its tributaries (Stewart 1992). The older females, aged 50 or more, produce great amounts of caviar, at least 3 million eggs, then go back to the Caspian for several years before returning to spawn again (Sparks 1992). Large sturgeon, because of their armor-like skin, become immobile and passive when caught (Stewart 1992). The fish are stunned and transferred to a fish barge in legal fisheries, where they are kept alive until processing. Then the sturgeon is cut open while still alive, and the roe is scooped out and placed in buckets (Stewart 1992).

After the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991, well-armed poaching groups replaced the strict legal fishery and began netting female Beluga (Stewart 1992). Russian citizens offered small jars of illegal caviar to foreigners at hotels and airports at exorbitant prices (Stewart 1992). As proof of the continued illegal trade, 450 tons of caviar from Russia and Iran were sold by the European caviar trading company Dieckmann & Hansen in 1995, but legal production of caviar was only 225 tons (DeSalle and Birstein 1996). The U.S. Department of Commerce statistics on caviar imports show a recent increase of 100 percent since 1991, according to investigations by two molecular biologists with the American Museum of Natural History in New York, Rob DeSalle and Vadim J. Birstein (1996). In order to determine the species from which various caviars derive, these two scientists did DNA analyses on 25 samples, 23 from gourmet stores in New York City, and two brought from Russia. Many were mislabeled, and several had come from threatened species. One sample of Siberian Sturgeon (Acipenser baerii) was labeled as Beluga (DeSalle and Birstein 1996). The quota for the latter species was 200 to 300 tons for all Siberian rivers, but in 1994, in the Ob River alone, the illegal catch was 250 to 300 tons (DeSalle and Birstein 1996).

By 1995, populations of sturgeon in the Caspian Sea reached new lows. In 1996, the IUCN Red List of Threatened Animals listed Beluga, Sevruga and Russian sturgeon as Endangered. The vast majority of sturgeon species of Eurasia were also listed, as a result of overfishing. In June 1997, the entire Order of sturgeon, Acipenseriformes, including all species of sturgeon and paddlefish, was listed on CITES Appendix II. Appendix II does not necessarily ban trade, but only requires export permits that certify catch did not deplete wild populations, and it is generally not strictly enforced. Illegal fishing by organized poaching gangs in countries lining the Caspian Sea continued, pushing depleted populations closer to extinction in the following years. It was estimated in 2000 that actual catch totaled 25 tons, 5 to 10 times the official catch (Tyler 2000). Even this was 0.1 percent of the 22,000 tons regularly caught each year in the 1970s (Higgins 2001). In 1999, official U.S. Commerce statistics showed 14 tons of Beluga as imported into the United States, representing the eggs of 1,600 female fish (Revkin 2000). Twice that many Beluga are killed by poachers because of the difficulty in distinguishing between male and female (Tagliabue 2000). In an effort to stop international commerce in Beluga, the most endangered of the Caspian Sea sturgeon, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Wildlife Conservation Society, and SeaWeb petitioned the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in December 2000 to list the species as Endangered under the Endangered Species Act. These organizations established a website, www.caviaremptor.org, urging consumers to stop buying caviar (Revkin 2000).

A scientific report compiled for CITES by TRAFFIC, an organization of the World Conservation Union, was issued in December 2000. It concluded that Beluga and other sturgeon from the Caspian were not being sufficiently protected under the terms of their Appendix II listing (Tyler 2000). Proposals to list Beluga and other critically endangered sturgeon were discussed at a meeting of a CITES Scientific Committee in December 2000. The committee agreed that Beluga and Kaluga (Huso dauricus), a sturgeon of the Amur River of eastern Siberia and northeastern China that can weigh up to a ton, merited listing on Appendix I, banning all commercial trade, because of their status (Revkin 2000). However, the committee decided against placing them on Appendix I because the members concluded that the trade ban would cause economic disruption in the impoverished Caspian region and would bankrupt legal traders, importers and hatcheries (Revkin 2000). Instead, it recommended a reduction of 80 percent in fishing quotas. In June 2001, the CITES committee formally rejected Appendix I listings for these sturgeon, giving countries bordering the Caspian until the end of the year to formulate a management plan that would conserve the species (Higgins 2001). The black market in caviar, unaffected by quotas and management systems, was estimated by Russia's Prosecutor General's Office in 1999 at between $2 billion and $4 billion a year (Filipov 2001a). It has not been controlled by any country along the Caspian Sea, with the possible exception of Iran. A Russian program to stop all vehicles on roads bordering the Caspian Sea to check them for illegal caviar has been a failure, as a Boston Globe correspondent found when traveling in a sedan with a hidden 70-pound Beluga. The car was waved along by a policeman after he asked if the driver had any fish or a secret compartment but did not search the car (Filipov 2000b).

In June 2001, four former Soviet republics on the Caspian Sea agreed to cooperate to try to stem the precipitous decline in sturgeon by conducting a scientific survey of populations and then setting quotas, along with coordination of anti-poaching campaigns (Higgins 2001). Russia, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan agreed to stop all fishing for sturgeon for 2001, and Turkmenistan is expected to approve management plans (Tagliabue 2001). This does not stop the international trade, however, either legal or illegal. Most chefs and restaurants in the United States and Europe have failed to boycott Beluga and other endangered caviar. An exception is the famous French chef, Jacques Pepin, who wrote an Op-ed essay for The New York Times on July 3, 2001, urging a boycott and stating that the temporary fishing ban in the Caspian was inadequate to protect these sturgeon. He commented: "There are many luxuries in life in which we can still indulge. The beluga sturgeon can't afford for us to indulge in this one" (Pepin 2001).

The snob value of caviar has been promoted for generations, and this, too, encourages overfishing. A lack of conservation among those who buy caviar may push Russian sturgeon past the point of recovery. Sturgeon are not alone in their dramatic declines from overfishing. Orange Roughy, Atlantic Bluefin Tuna, Atlantic Cod and Haddock, Chilean Bass and many species of shark are among other fish pushed toward extinction in the past decade.