Current:Home > StocksMexico-based startup accused of selling health drink made from endangered fish: "Nature's best kept secret"-LoTradeCoin
Mexico-based startup accused of selling health drink made from endangered fish: "Nature's best kept secret"
View Date:2024-12-23 18:55:59
Environmental watchdogs accused a Mexico-based startup Thursday of violating international trade law by selling a health supplement made from endangered totoaba fish to several countries including the U.S. and China.
Advocates told The Associated Press they also have concerns that the company, The Blue Formula, could be selling fish that is illegally caught in the wild.
The product, which the company describes as "nature's best kept secret," is a small sachet of powder containing collagen taken from the fish that is designed to be mixed into a drink.
Under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, to which Mexico and the U.S. are both signatories, any export for sale of totoaba fish is illegal, unless bred in captivity with a particular permit. As a listed protected species, commercial import is also illegal under U.S. trade law.
Totoaba fish have been listed as an endangered species under the U.S. Endangered Species Act since 1979, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
The environmental watchdog group Cetacean Action Treasury first cited the company in November. Then on Thursday, a coalition of environmental charities - The Center for Biological Diversity, National Resources Defense Council and Animal Welfare Institute - filed a written complaint to CITES.
The Blue Formula did not immediately respond to an AP request for comment.
The company claims on its website to operate "100%" sustainably by sourcing fish from Cygnus Ocean, a farm which has a permit to breed totoaba, and using a portion of their profits to release some farmed fish back into the wild.
However, Cygnus Ocean does not have a permit for commercial export of their farmed fish, according to the environmental groups. The farm also did not immediately respond to a request from the AP for comment.
While the ecological impact of breeding totoaba in captivity is much smaller relative to wild fishing, advocates like Alejandro Olivera, the Center for Biological Diversity's Mexico representative, fear the company and farm could be used as a front.
"There is no good enforcement of the traceability of totoaba in Mexico," said Olivera, "so it could be easily used to launder wild totoaba."
Gillnet fishing for wild totoaba is illegal and one of the leading killers of critically endangered vaquita porpoise, of which recent surveys suggest less than a dozen may exist in the wild.
"This hunger for endangered species is killing vaquitas here. Because the mesh size of the gillnets for totoaba is about the size of a head of a vaquita. So they get easily entangled," Lorenzo Rojas-Bracho, who works with Mexico's National Institute of Ecology, previously told "60 Minutes."
Gillnetting is driven by the exorbitant price for totoaba bladders in China, where they are sold as a delicacy for as much as gold.
As "60 Minutes" previously reported, the bladders are believed to possess medicinal value which gives them monetary value. The environmental group Greenpeace used hidden cameras to capture Hong Kong merchants trying to sell totoaba swim bladders. The prices went up to $40,000.
The Blue Formula's supplement costs just under $100 for 200 grams.
In October U.S. Customs and Border Protection seized over $1 million worth of totoaba bladders in Arizona, hidden in a shipment of frozen fish. The agency called it "one of the larger commercial seizures of its kind in the U.S."
Roughly as much again was seized in Hong Kong the same month, in transit from Mexico to Thailand.
- In:
- Endangered Species
- Mexico
veryGood! (8)
Related
- Don't Miss This Sweet Moment Between Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce's Dads at the Kansas City Chiefs Game
- The Largest Arctic Science Expedition in History Finds Itself on Increasingly Thin Ice
- Shooter in attack that killed 5 at Colorado Springs gay nightclub pleads guilty, gets life in prison
- Mayan Lopez Shares the Items She Can't Live Without, From Dreamy Body Creams to Reusable Grocery Bags
- The Best Gifts for Men – That He Won’t Want to Return
- Judge Dismisses New York City Climate Lawsuit Against 5 Oil Giants
- Pregnant Serena Williams Shares Hilariously Relatable Message About Her Growing Baby Bump
- America’s Wind Energy Boom May Finally Be Coming to the Southeast
- Stock market today: Asian stocks decline as China stimulus plan disappoints markets
- America’s Wind Energy Boom May Finally Be Coming to the Southeast
Ranking
- Taylor Swift's Mom Andrea Gives Sweet Nod to Travis Kelce at Chiefs Game
- Supreme Court clears way for redrawing of Louisiana congressional map to include 2nd majority-Black district
- America’s Wind Energy Boom May Finally Be Coming to the Southeast
- This Amazon Maxi Dress Has 2,300+ Five-Star Ratings— & Reviewers Say It Fits Beautifully
- California man allegedly shot couple and set their bodies, Teslas on fire in desert
- Shooter in attack that killed 5 at Colorado Springs gay nightclub pleads guilty, gets life in prison
- Taking the Climate Fight to the Streets
- New York AG: Exxon Climate Fraud Investigation Nearing End
Recommendation
-
Army veteran reunites with his K9 companion, who served with him in Afghanistan
-
Love Is Blind’s Bartise Bowden Breaks Down His Relationship With His “Baby Mama”
-
American Climate Video: Hurricane Michael Intensified Faster Than Even Long-Time Residents Could Imagine
-
Plastic is suffocating coral reefs — and it's not just bottles and bags
-
Paraguay vs. Argentina live updates: Watch Messi play World Cup qualifying match tonight
-
Life on an Urban Oil Field
-
Plastic is suffocating coral reefs — and it's not just bottles and bags
-
Transcript: Cindy McCain on Face the Nation, June 25, 2023