Prepared by:
Lisa Speer,
Natural Resources Defense Council
Liz Lauck and Ellen Pikitch, Ph.D., Wildlife Conservation Society
Susan Boa, Lisa Dropkin and Vikki Spruill, SeaWeb
December 2000
Table of Contents
Overfishing, illegal fishing, and lack of effective management
Habitat destruction
Pollution
Status of Caspian Sea Sturgeon
The International Caviar Trade
The Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES)
Smuggling
Implications for sturgeon populations in the United States
U.S. Commercial Fisheries
Policy Recommendations
Consumer recommendations
Appendix I: Conservation of critically endangered sturgeon outside the Caspian Sea
The authors wish to thank the following reviewers for their thoughtful comments and helpful insights:
Dr. David Secor, University of Maryland; Dr. Boyd Kynard, U.S. Geological Survey; Dr. John Waldman, Hudson River Foundation; Craig Hoover, TRAFFIC/WWF; Dr. Rebecca Goldburg, Environmental Defense; Bruce McKay and Bill Mott, SeaWeb; Dr. Phaedra Doukakis, Dr. Steve Zack, Dan Erickson, Wildlife Conservation Society; Elliott Negin and Elizabeth Heyd, Natural Resources Defense Council.
The views expressed in this report are those of the authors, and do not necessarily reflect those of the reviewers.
Thanks also to: Jeremy Feigelson, Howard Hogan, Rachel Meyer, Dawn Lang, Prosanta Chakrabarty, Bethany Bacher, Laura Siegel, Laura Robb, Russell Unger, Hasten Design and Tom Johnson.
Special thanks to The David and Lucile Packard Foundation.
