Tommy Trenchard (South Africa) documents the bycatch of a requiem shark, its body arched in a final act of resistance.
Tommy was travelling on the Greenpeace ship Arctic Sunrise. The ship’s research expedition aimed to document the bycatch of sharks. This is where fishing boats targeting tuna and swordfish accidentally catch sharks too. The team hoped to highlight the lack of effective regulation of industrial-scale fishing in international waters.
Around 80 million sharks are taken from the world’s oceans every year. Because of fishing, numbers of sharks worldwide have dropped since 1970. Three-quarters of all species are now at risk of extinction.
In March 2023 UN member states agreed the content of the Global Ocean Treaty. This provides a framework for designating 30% of international waters as Marine Protected Areas by 2030.
South Africa
Tommy is an independent documentary photographer based in Cape Town, South Africa. He covers a broad range of environmental, humanitarian and cultural topics. His stories have been widely published by magazines around the world, and he also collaborates frequently with non-profit organisations to highlight pressing social and environmental issues.
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