What a Feeling! Helping Mantas, Devil Rays, and Sawfishes get Better Legal Protection

November 2019

Thank you to Dr Ramon Bonfil for this personal insight into the work that goes on behind the scenes in Mexico to achieve great victories such as this!

Ramon with a sawfish.

One of the most satisfying and meaningful achievements in a scientist’s career is to exert some actual positive change in the real world, no matter how small. Publishing scientific papers, being invited as keynote speaker to scientific meetings, and delivering presentations about our research are all great and very important to the advancement of science. Even the selfish pleasure of working in the field two or three times a year and admiring first-hand all the marvels the sea and nature have to offer us is fantastic and incredibly satisfying. But nothing compares with the feeling that something we have done, will actually translate into positive impact for nature, living species or human communities.

I have been lucky to enjoy this satisfaction twice in my life. The first time was in 2004 when I helped prepare the proposal to list great white sharks in Appendix II of CITES and gave it an additional push by presenting my research at the CITES CoP in Bangkok, showing that great whites are at risk of being killed by fishers during their lengthy transoceanic migrations. That proposal was approved and I will always feel fulfilled to know that I generated more than scientific discoveries, which many times are meaningful only to my colleagues (and sometimes not even to all of them!). The second time that my hard work and experience helped get a real victory for conservation was last November 14, when the list of species at risk of extinction was officially updated in Mexican legislation when the Official Diary of the Federation published “Modifications to Annex III of the Official Norm for the Protection of Species at Risk of Extinction NOM-059-SEMARNAT-2010”. Six species of manta and devil rays were included in this list for the first time, as (Pr) Sujetas a Protección Especial or Subject to Special Protection, and are now protected by law in Mexico banning their capture or killing. Additionally, two species of sawfish were re-classified from (A) Amenazadas or threatened, to (P) En Peligro or Endangered. And all of this was mostly, but not exclusively, thanks to my initiative and work!

Mobula munkiana in La Paz

Back in 2014 when I returned to my natal Mexico after 25 years abroad, the first thing I did was an assessment of the state of knowledge about sharks and rays in Mexico and a review of all conservation legislation covering them. This highlighted an urgent need to assess the conservation status of sawfishes, mantas and devil rays, as well as to research the basic biology and ecology of these species. I founded Océanos Vivientes A. C. within a few months of this, specifically to fill those gaps in knowledge, and since 2015 we have been working steadily with sawfishes and mobulid rays. As part of our first study, I prepared the technical documents justifying changes in the classification of the smalltooth sawfish Pristis pectinata and the largetooth sawfish Pristis pristis in the NOM-059-SEMARNAT-2010. Both species had been wrongly classified as threatened for over a decade, instead of being considered as endangered. At the core of the technical documents was the evaluation of the risk of extinction for each species, using a specific method established by Mexican law and known as MER. This method analyses for each species information on its distribution range, the status of its habitat, its intrinsic biological vulnerability, and the impact of human activities on it, and assigns them to one of the following categories: (Pr) Sujetas a Protección Especial or Subject to Special Protection, (A) Amenazadas or Threatened, (P) En Peligro de Extinción, or Endangered with extinction, and (E) Probablemente Extintas en el Medio Silvestre or Probably Extinct in the Wild. Unfortunately, while the proposal to re-categorize both sawfish species was approved in 2016, this was not officially enacted until two weeks ago, almost 4 years late.

A sawfish.

The story of the listing of all 6 Mexican Mobula species is less dramatic. During 2018 a process to update the list of species at risk took place inside the ministry of environment (SEMARNAT) and Océanos Vivientes A. C. partnered with another Mexican NGO, CODEMAR, to prepare the justifying technical documents to include some elasmobranchs in the NOM-059-SEMARNAT-2010. At my suggestion, we decided to go for all 6 Mobula species and the oceanic white tip shark. Once more, I prepared the 7 technical documents following the MER, and all the proposals were submitted in mid 2018 by our two organizations. Within a couple of months, all six Mobula species were accepted to be listed, but the oceanic white tip shark proposal was rejected. However, once again the list was not officially updated for over a year, without any explanation from SEMARNAT and despite several letters to the ministry inquiring why the official updating of the list was delayed.

Fortunately, all this protracted waiting came to an end two weeks ago, when the list was finally officially published, providing additional protection to the two sawfish species mentioned above as well as to the the giant manta Mobula birostris, the Atlantic devil ray M. hypostoma, the spinetail manta M. mobular, the pygmy devil ray M. munkiana, the Chilean devil ray M. tarapacana and the bentfin devil ray M. thurstoni. I feel that I have delivered my two cents towards a better world!

RAMON BONFIL

Executive Director of Oceanos Vivientes A.C.