Victory! The Food Network Stops Promoting Shark Meat

by Sarah Parsons · 2011-08-15 05:18:00 UTC
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Threatened sharks just swam a little closer to conservation. After many people signed a petition urging the Food Network to stop featuring shark as food, the media company removed all shark recipes from its popular Web site and issued a statement on the future use of shark at the network.

“As a policy, Food Network and Cooking Channel do not incorporate or showcase recipes that involve animals on endangered species list or the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch list, with the recent addition of sharks to those watch-lists, we will make sure that future content does not highlight shark as an ingredient. We understand there are many species with sustainability concerns, and we make efforts to stay informed and pass that information onto our audience.”-- Susan Stockton, Food Network Kitchens

After Change.org member, Jessica Belsky, launched the petition targeting the Food Network, the media company removed recipes from its Web site and issued a statement in fewer than 10 days. More than 30,000 people eventually joined the online campaign, many after the Food Network had already committed to go shark-free.

The commitment from the Food Network is certainly much-needed. According to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), nearly one-third of shark species are currently threatened with extinction, largely due to the demand for shark fin soup and shark meat. Some shark populations have declined by as much as 90 percent in recent years!

While the commitment is good news for sharks, it also benefits the oceans at large. Sharks are apex predators, meaning that they serve a crucial role in oceanic ecosystems by keeping other species' populations in checks. If sharks are fished out of that role, it can bring the demise of multiple marine creatures.

It's great that the Food Network will no longer feature shark as an ingredient in its recipes and that the network will use the Monterey Bay Aquarium's Seafood Watch list to guide its content. Seafood Watch ranks fish on their sustainability, with more than 20 species of fish like shark, bluefin tuna, Chilean sea bass, and orange roughy currently included on the Red/Avoid section. Consumers can help conserve the world's oceans by pressuring food purveyors and corporations like the Food Network to avoid serving and selling these Red list species.

If you'd like to help conserve sharks, you can also take action on other campaigns hosted on Change.org. Add your name to petitions to get a ban on the sale of shark in California and Toronto and pressure New York City's Golden Unicorn restaurant to take shark fin soup off its menu.

Photo credit: karen horton via Flickr

Sarah Parsons is Change.org's Sustainable Food Editor. Her work has appeared in Popular Science, OnEarth, Audubon and Plenty.
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