BATANGAS CITY ? The Philippines may soon lose its thresher sharks ? listed as ?vulnerable? species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature ? if their slaughter for meat and fins continues unchecked.

?The extent of the fishery situation with regard to the thresher sharks in the Batangas Bay area is absolutely ? in my honest, scientific opinion ? not sustainable,? Dr. Simon Oliver, shark specialist and chair of the Thresher Shark Research and Conservation Group based in the United Kingdom, said.

?You?re at the risk of losing your shark population,? he told the Inquirer in an interview on Wednesday during a forum on Thresher Shark Conservation hosted by the University of Batangas in Batangas City.

The population of thresher shark species (Alopias vulpinus) worldwide has already declined by around 75 percent, said Oliver, quoting a 2003 report from the authoritative Science journal.

Scientists like him, he said, were particularly concerned with the dwindling populations of bigeye, common and pelagic thresher sharks in Philippine waters since all three species were already declared ?vulnerable.? This means that the thresher sharks are now facing a ?high risk of extinction in the wild,? he said.

Locally known as banderahan and feeding on sardines, cattle pods and crustaceans, thresher sharks can live up to 28 years if left undisturbed, Oliver, a professor of the University of Wales in the UK, said.

However, the sale of shark meat and fins, particularly in the public market of Batangas City, is threatening the fish population in Batangas Bay.

Since Dec. 23, 2007, at least 40 thresher sharks have been killed in the coastal villages of Wawa, Pagkilatan and Mabacong in Batangas City, Bauan town and Barangay Talaga in Mabini town, the environmental group First Philippine Conservation Inc. reported.

Shark meat is sold at P150 per kilo and shark fins at P1,000 per kilo in the public markets of Batangas City and as far as Lucena City in Quezon, according to an environmentalist, who requested anonymity for having pending businesses with the Batangas City government.

Staggering figures

?It means that the numbers are quite staggering. The animal produces only two offspring and it takes a long time. This is a very very alarming situation,? Oliver said. Thresher sharks mature late. A female shark must be 8-13 years old to reproduce, while a male shark has to be 7-10 years old.

?Because thresher sharks are oceanic, they migrate throughout the Philippine seas. This means that the sharks taken from the Batangas area may impact the same populations that visit other areas,? Oliver said.

He was specifically referring to the Malapascua Island in Cebu, where 80 percent of the local economy depended on tourism industry generated by the sharks. But reports that reached him last week said the place ?has not seen sharks for the past two months.?

?As a scientist, I tell you that the only reason they?re not there is because they?ve been fished out,? Oliver said.

In March alone, 22 thresher sharks had already been hunted in the bay, he said. One of them was a female that had just given birth based on an examination of the shark specimens found.

Tourism scheme

Oliver likewise believed that the problem of thresher shark hunting in Batangas could be addressed by developing and implementing shark dive tourism similar to Malapascua, which, he said, would help earn money for the city.

It will also help provide alternative jobs, like boat captains and tourist guides, among local fishers who had once hunted them, he said.

?Whereas one kilo of thresher shark meat presently fetches P150 in a Batangas fish market, one live shark sighting of a thresher shark in your waters by scuba divers could generate a tourism industry worth millions of dollars,? he said.

Based on the Malapascua experience, Oliver expected that Batangas City could earn some P16,000 daily and P5.8 million annually for a single live thresher shark. It could already earn P6,000 from six tourists who pay P1,000 as diving fee in order to witness a single thresher shark, he said. This excludes expenses in hotel accommodations, meals, transportation, massage and laundry.

Task force

Still, Oliver said establishing a tourism industry in Batangas would not be easy since there was a need to know which places the sharks regularly visit and how frequently they go there.

City administrator Felipe Baroja said the local government welcomed Oliver?s idea. Mayor Eduardo Dimacuha has already formed a task force on endangered species that would oversee the hunting and selling of the sharks, particularly in the public market, he said.

?The problem here is we don?t have an existing national law that prohibits hunting and selling of thresher sharks so we couldn?t simply arrest people. What we need is a local ordinance,? Baroja said

The city, he said, was already conducting a public campaign to explain the relevance of conserving thresher sharks and why it was prohibited to sell them.

He also said it would be quite costly on their part to jump-start a shark tourism industry, since Oliver had told him that $15,000 to $20,000 was needed to start a shark tourism industry.

Councilor Marvey Mariño, committee on environment chair, said the council would sponsor an ordinance ?soon? for the protection of thresher sharks.