The ban will apply to the sale, possession or distribution of shark fins and is being lauded by shark conservation groups.

Shark-fin soup is currently served in several Chinese restaurants in the state.

Restaurants will be allowed to finish their shark fin inventory. However, after next July fines will run from USD 5,000 for a first offense up to USD 50,000 and as much as a year in jail for the third offense.

"People from around the world have been following this Hawaii bill every step of the way," said Mary O'Malley of the New York-based conservation group Shark Savers, UPI.com reports. "The success of the bill has motivated people in Hong Kong, Malaysia, other states in the US, Canada and even Ireland to seek shark-fin-ban legislation modeled after the Hawaii bill."

Exceptions will be made for research purposes. Researchers will have to seek permission from the state Department of Land and Natural Resources.

Every year, several tens of millions sharks are killed for their fins to make the high-end soup in Asia. Sharks are taken aboard ships to have their fins cut off while still alive and be tossed back into the water, where they die from their injuries.

The shark trade is considered the main cause of the dramatic declines of many species. The scalloped hammered population has withered by 98 per cent in certain regions; the oceanic whitetip shark population has declined by 90 per cent in the central Pacific Ocean and by 99 per cent in the Gulf of Mexico.

The International Union for the Conservation of Nature's (IUCN) Red List has determined that 32 per cent of open ocean sharks and rays are now in danger of extinction -- a much higher amount than mammals or birds.

Earlier this year, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) failed to grant international protection to eight shark species. Due to pressure by Japan, votes to protect sharks and other marine species have persistently failed.

Although Hawaii's market for shark fin soup is minute against that in China and Japan, the new law is largely symbolic of the need to protect shark populations. Hawaii will be the first state to institute such a ban in the US.

Source: The Fish Site

Updated by Vietfish Community