🔗 Share this article

Great white sharks in the Mediterranean waters are facing a serious threat of extinction, with unlawful fishing practices being a major contributor to their rapid population drop.

This assessment is based on research by scientists, who worked alongside an marine preservation group. They indicate that several critically endangered species – including great white sharks – are appearing for sale in marketplaces across the North African coast.

These sharks are one of more than 20 Mediterranean shark species shielded by international agreements, which prohibits to target them or to sell them.

However, by observing harbors along the Mediterranean coast of North Africa, the research team uncovered that no fewer than 40 great white sharks have been slaughtered in that region in the single year of 2025.

Videos shared online showing endangered sharks being unloaded in North African ports has been confirmed.

One video showed a sizeable great white shark being pulled from a boat from a fishing boat in an Algerian port. Another, filmed in Tunisia, shows parts of what looks like a short-finned mako shark, which is also a protected and endangered species.

Last Shark Stronghold

The principal scientist, stated that many shark species – white sharks in particular – had suffered a severe drop in the Mediterranean in the past years.

"No other stretch of water is subjected to such fishing pressure as the Mediterranean Sea," he said. "The effects of large-scale fishing has been intensifying... and it's possible that they will become extinct in the foreseeable future."

The Mediterranean great whites is now designated as Critically Endangered by the key international body.

In their most recent effort to find and study the predators, the team worked in the Strait of Sicily – an area identified as a "key remaining habitat" in the Mediterranean for several threatened shark species.

An important goal of their project was to fit a satellite tracking tag onto a white shark – something that has remained unachieved in the Mediterranean Sea.

To do this, the researchers used a large amount of chum – including baitfish and a substantial volume of tuna oil to create a "oil slick" that many sharks can detect from a great distance.

Even after a fortnight of effort – baiting the ocean, collecting water samples to look for genetic material and using remote cameras – the researchers failed to encounter any animals to tag.

They captured only a fleeting sighting of one blue shark on their submarine cameras.

"It's discouraging," the lead researcher said. "It just shows how degraded this ecosystem is."

As the team searched for living sharks, they also learned that a young great white shark had been captured and killed in a regional fishery – just a short distance from where they were working.

It is uncertain whether that shark was caught by accident in nets or lines, or if it was hunted.

The team, however, calculates that more than 40 great white sharks have been taken along that coastline. "This is a lot for a critically endangered population," the researcher emphasized.

Protected Sharks Traded

The team, along with local partners, are monitoring several fishing ports in the region. Evidence shows that endangered sharks are caught, landed and offered for sale in countries including the region.

The regulations safeguarding sharks are complex. Currently, two dozen endangered species have global protection – including mako, angel, threshers and hammerheads.

An international agreement states that those species cannot be "retained on board, transhipped, landed, transferred, stored, sold or displayed or offered for sale".

The agreement specifies "they must be released alive [where] possible". Those rules do not address accidental bycatch and compliance varies from country to country.

A expert noted that his own research found several great whites on sale. But, he said, there was a seeming silver lining in the fact that white sharks were being found in markets.

"It shows that there is wildlife left," he said. "And if we can preserve this, there is a chance of recovery."

Possible Solutions

In less affluent areas in North Africa, fishermen who catch sharks might face the dilemma of whether to earn a livelihood, or release a protected animal to the ocean.

"Why would they throw sharks back into the sea when they must feed their households?" asked a regional marine biologist. "If you provide alternatives and education in more selective fishing, they will not catch these sharks."

Another expert added that if countries around the Mediterranean collaborated, "there is hope."

"But," he continued, "we've got to act very quickly."