A. Species
Scientific name: Sphyrna zyagena
Common name(s): Smooth hammerhead shark
Global IUCN Red List Threat Status:
B. Location of use
Geographic location(s):
- New Zealand
- Pacific - southwest
Country/Region:
C. Scale of assessment
Scale of assessment: National Level
Name/Details of location: New Zealand
D. Timescale of use
Start Year: 1989
End Year: 2013
E. Information about the use
How is the wild species sourced?: Wild species sourced from its natural habitat
Type of use: Extractive
Practice of use: Targeted fishing harvesting/exploiting or collecting wild aquatic resources
Lethal or non-lethal: Lethal
Does this use involve take/extraction of: The whole entire organism
Purpose(s) of end use: Food and feed and Recreation
Motivation of use: Largescale commercial exploitation for trade
Is this use legal or illegal?: Legal under national law
F. Information about the Users
Which stakeholder(s) does the record primarily focus on?: National / local private sector and International private sector
G. Information about the sustainability of use
Is there evidence that the use is having an impact on the target species?: Wild species sourced from its natural habitat
Has an assessment (or judgement) of sustainability of the use of the target species from an ecological perspective been recorded?: Yes, considered sustainable
Details of assessment carried out: CITES-NDF Report
Brief summary on why the use has been assessed/judged to be sustainable or unsustainable: Overall, it appears that the amount of smooth hammerhead reported landed in New Zealand in recent years is probably sustainable. he population status of smooth hammerheads in the New Zealand EEZ is not known, but at least juveniles and subadults appear to be common in suitable inshore habitats, and their stock does not seem to have collapsed as the over-exploited Mediterranean and Atlantic stocks have done.
Has an assessment (or judgement) of sustainability of the use of the target species from an economic perspective been recorded?: not recorded
Has an assessment (or judgement) of sustainability of the use of the target species from a social perspective been recorded?: No, sustainability not determined
Details of assessment carried out: CITES NDF Report
Brief summary on why the use has been assessed/judged to be sustainable or unsustainable: There is very little information on the level of recreational or customary fisheries in New Zealand waters. It is suspected that many juveniles are caught and drowned in recreational or customary inshore set-nets targeting flatfish, mullet and other inshore species. Both recreational and customary line fishing impacts are thought to be negligible because many are returned alive to the sea. There is no known illegal targeted catch of smooth hammerhead sharks.
Has an assessment (or judgement) of sustainability of the use of the target species from a human health perspective been recorded?: not recorded
Has an assessment (or judgement) of sustainability of the use of the target species from an animal health/welfare perspective been recorded?: not recorded
Recommendations provided in the record to maintain or enhance the sustainability of the use of the target species
Recommendations to improve the NDF process: 1. Ministry for Primary Industries seriously consider the merits and costs of including smooth hammerhead in the Quota Management System to better manage stocks of this ‘key shark species’ as required as a signatory of the WCPFC, and to make the NDF process of CITES more defendable. Even though the apparent annual take is very low compared with many commercial fish species, there is a high level of public interest, nationally and internationally, in the population trends and conservation of sharks. 2. Ministry for Primary Industries should publish annual catch statistics for smooth hammerheads as they do for many other QMS and non-QMS species in their annual “Stock Status” or “Species” tables. 3. Increase observer coverage on vessels using set-nets and trawling in inshore waters of the northern North Island, to better assess the true capture statistics, and the percentage released alive and well. Ensure that observer effort over all fisheries encountering smooth hammerheads is applied to collect and analyse data on the number, weight, sex, age, total fork length, and total length of all smooth hammerheads landed, and those discarded alive or dead. An eye should be kept out for other hammerhead species at the same time. 4. Actively promote and expand a tagging programme on commercial and recreational vessels so that, wherever possible, large samples of juveniles, subadults and adults being released alive are tagged so that we can learn more about the movements, growth and survival of this under-studied species. 5. Research, develop and implement specific methods for successful handling, tagging and release of smooth hammerheads. 6. The recreational and customary take of smooth hammerheads must be estimated through survey of recreational and customary fishers. 7. The volumes of smooth hammerhead product introduced from the high seas to New Zealand be monitored very closely, and if necessary fins and carcasses should be checked to see that the shark species claimed is accurately recorded, and that smooth hammerhead products are not being imported as another species. 8. New Zealand collaborates with Oceania neighbours, and especially with WCPFC, to better understand the movements and population dynamics of smooth hammerheads moving in and out of the New Zealand EEZ, and especially into other national fishing jurisdictions. At present there is clearly a regional link as far as Tonga, and hence probably to Fiji, and also probably with Australia.
Record source
Information about the record source: scientific_pub
Date of publication/issue/production: 2018-01-01T00:00:00+0000
Source Reference(s):
Sphyrna zygaena.
Hugh A Robertson
New Zealand Scientific Authority for CITES
Science & Policy Group
Department of Conservation
NEW ZEALAND
Date of record entry: 2023-09-14