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Ensuring effective conservation and management of sharks is a high priority for the United States. Sharks are particularly susceptible to overexploitation because they are typically long-lived, slow-growing, and produce few young. Many shark species are apex predators and are vital to the health of the ecosystems they inhabit, so their conservation is an integral part of ecosystem-based fisheries management. Sharks are currently taken in fisheries directed for sharks, and are also caught incidentally in fisheries directed for other species.

Sharks are also subject to the practice of "finning," which is the removal and retention of shark fins and the discard of shark carcasses at sea. One key aspect of the language agreed at the UN negotiations is the call for improved compliance with current bans on shark finning, including measures requiring that sharks be landed with fins attached...