Comments for Southern Fried Science

Comment on Making Your Donations Count: 5 simple guidelines for selecting conservation organizations to support by Chris Parsons

Chris Parsons — Thu, 23 May 2013 01:58:51 +0000

The issue with point (5) is that some NGOs are attacked by bad guy corporations who try to smear them. To give you a specific example, David mentioned the Humane Society above – there is a website called Humane Watch that publishes smears (most libelous) against the Humane Society, but Humane Watch is funded mostly by corporations who are opposed to the Humane Society’s campaigns for farm animal welfare. Most of the big environmental NGOs, and many leading scientists, working on climate change have been attacked by comporate or politically-funded attacks at some time. The criticism and attacks can be very sophisticated and reasonable sounding at times, because their opponents can afford good PR companies and such. So I definitely agree with the skepticism caveat. Some of the best NGOs can be attacked the most.

I would add a (6) – Talk to someone working in the field you want to support, who do they recommend?They probably have a good idea as to the NGOs that give you the best bang for your buck, the ones with the best reputations for integrity, collaboration and effectiveness … and the ones to avoid.

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Comment on Making Your Donations Count: 5 simple guidelines for selecting conservation organizations to support by Charity Navigator

Charity Navigator — Wed, 22 May 2013 14:55:08 +0000

Thank you for encouraging your readers to give generously and also be smart givers!

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Comment on Making Your Donations Count: 5 simple guidelines for selecting conservation organizations to support by Alex Warneke

Alex Warneke — Wed, 22 May 2013 13:57:24 +0000

ADT-
It’s funny that you mention #2. Note…if you ask for their supporting documents and they don’t give them to you unless you make a donation first…wise to NOT donate to them. Though I won’t say names…this actually happened to me with one of the major NGO’s. I most likely could have easily looked it up online, but the eager representative didn’t even point me in that direction.

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Comment on Making Your Donations Count: 5 simple guidelines for selecting conservation organizations to support by Andrew David Thaler

Andrew David Thaler — Wed, 22 May 2013 13:38:21 +0000

That’s a great point, Dave. A $10 donation is going to make a bigger difference to an NGO with an operating budget in the thousands than to one of the big international orgs than operate in the millions.

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Comment on Making Your Donations Count: 5 simple guidelines for selecting conservation organizations to support by David Shiffman

David Shiffman — Wed, 22 May 2013 13:29:20 +0000

Excellent list. The only things I’d add are:

1) If you’re donating a relatively small amount of money, it can benefit smaller NGOs more on the margins.

2) While I agree with #2 above, you can also specify that your donation goes only to a specific cause within an organization. For example, I don’t agree with everything the Humane Society says or does, but we rescued my puppy from a Humane Society shelter and I’ve donated to that shelter specifically. That’s also the same reason I don’t donate to the Duke Annual Fund, but instead donate to specific things at Duke.

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Comment on Good Conservation Policies Can Push Markets Towards Conservation by Chuck Bangley

Chuck Bangley — Mon, 20 May 2013 15:23:51 +0000

Thanks for setting me straight on CITES and MSC history, Sonja. This is what happens when I try to post between check-out dives…
I agree that the annual jacking-up of the dogfish quota is a cause for concern. That said, the population of spiny dogfish (even after their late-90s slump and accounting for the upcoming dip) is naturally much higher than that of the coastal shark species (with the possible exception of sharpnose and smooth dogfish), so any coastal shark quota should be considerably lower than the dogfish quota. Also, with only two processors on the east coast, it’s possible that the higher quota will continue the glut (and resulting low market price) and keep fishermen from ever actually hitting that quota. This year’s dogfish season will be a test of that, though I’d definitely prefer management to reflect a more cautious approach in the first place.

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Comment on Good Conservation Policies Can Push Markets Towards Conservation by Sonja Fordham

Sonja Fordham — Sun, 19 May 2013 16:35:11 +0000

Glad to hear the paper is out. I look forward to reading it. In the meantime, re: this blog post: I agree that CITES App II offers substantial benefits for both spiny dogfish and countries that manage the species. The US, however, did not “join in” in the EU proposals to list the species under CITES. In 2007, the US decided to vote ‘yes’ at the very last minute (during the CoP), and did not support the listing in 2010. Other countries with about as much management as the US and Canada (quotas) include New Zealand and the EU (EU TACs set at zero now, but that can change). Countries can trade in App II listed species if they find “non-detriment” (for which they have some latitude). MSC certification has been granted for Canadian fisheries only on the west coast and for US fisheries only on the east coast. (Lack of cooperative trans-boundary management for straddling stocks did not prevent MSC approval). I can’t agree that the US Atlantic spiny dogfish quota is still “low” as it is now 10 times what is was five years ago and dwarfs quotas for any other US shark. In any case, spreading the appreciation that people increasingly demonstrate for bigger sharks to include smaller species would seem to be an important step for securing a spiny dogfish CITES listing in the future.

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Comment on U.S. government: shark fin bans “significantly undermine conservation and management of Federal shark fisheries” by GD

GD — Fri, 17 May 2013 03:12:32 +0000

David, I stated that the US market is detrimental, not specifically blamed. If the report states that demand for fins in general is a driver of mortality, then ALL markets should be presumed detrimental. Furthermore, I would like to see references to the particular pages that you are looking at.

In any case, the question of whether or not US fisheries are well-managed is irrelevant to the fact that some pelagic species regularly migrate outside US waters. Also, you seem to have ignored my point that just because US shark fisheries may be well-managed doesn’t mean that fins on the market come from those fisheries (see the reference in my earlier comment to Clarke’s Hong Kong study, in which nobody could tell where over 50% of the fins came from).

Is there a reason why you can’t seem to quote me correctly in your rebuttals?

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Comment on U.S. government: shark fin bans “significantly undermine conservation and management of Federal shark fisheries” by David Shiffman

David Shiffman — Thu, 16 May 2013 11:19:39 +0000

The report doesn’t exclude the U.S. from culpability. Someone incorrectly claimed that it specifically blamed the U.S. markets, and I pointed out that that was incorrect, that it does not say that the U.S. markets are particularly harmful. The report, however, does note that the U.S. makes up a small percentage of the market and that U.S. fisheries are particularly well managed.

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Comment on U.S. government: shark fin bans “significantly undermine conservation and management of Federal shark fisheries” by GD

GD — Thu, 16 May 2013 03:34:16 +0000

As a postscript to my earlier reply, I would like to refer you to section 5.3 of the IUCN report, “Use and Trade,” which demonstrates just how complicated it can be to determine the sourcing of shark fins. First of all, the report states that the top five exporters of shark fin products by weight as of 2005 were Taiwan, Spain, Japan, Panama and Costa Rica (readers of this blog are probably aware that Costa Rica has recently passed much stricter legislation to regulate shark fisheries). The United States is not listed as a major exporter; therefore, it may be that our directed shark fisheries, well-managed though they may be, do not play a significant role in the market. This would appear to reinforce my point that although the fins may be traded in the United States, they do not necessarily come from the United States.

Making matters more complex is the fact that “During the past two decades, at least half of the shark fins traded by 86 countries [I would italicize that if I could] passed through the Hong Kong market.” The report further adds that in a comprehensive study of the Hong Kong market Clarke was unable to determine the origin or even the species of over half the fins. What this appears to tell us is that
a) the US is probably importing at least some fins from Hong Kong;
b) because we have no idea where those fins came from, we cannot say with certainty that they came from well-controlled US fisheries;
and c) we cannot say with certainty that our own directed fisheries (never mind bycatch fisheries) are contributing to the sales of shark fins in the states that wish to ban those sales.

In short, my own recommendation is “in dubio abstinii.”

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