Shark finning involves removing fins and discarding living sharks at sea. The welfare harms are severe and the practice drives significant population declines across shark species.
Shark finning welfare is characterized by a particularly prolonged and helpless form of death - animals stripped of the fins needed for movement and oxygen exchange are returned alive to the sea where they sink, suffocate, or are eaten by other predators. Research on shark pain processing suggests they have nociceptive systems capable of transmitting distress signals. The scale of shark killing for fins represents an enormous aggregate welfare harm, compounded by the ecological cascade effects of removing apex predators from marine ecosystems. The welfare case reinforces the conservation case: sustainable shark fisheries that prohibit finning protect both individual animals and ecosystem integrity.