The conservation body responsible for estimating population of beluga sturgeon and setting caviar-harvesting quotas may have misjudged this year's quote so badly as to drive the species to extinction.
Trade in beluga and the caviar they produce is governed by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species. CITES believes that beluga sturgeon numbers are on the increase, reaching 11.6 million in 2002, up from 9.3 million in 2001 and 7.6 million in 1998…
But critics say there may in fact be fewer than half a million fish left, and that raw data published by CITES itself suggests that the sturgeon population crashed by 40 per cent in 2002 alone. Continued fishing and trade in beluga caviar will only hasten the demise of the species, they say. CITES's approval also comes at a time when the US government, the world's leading importer of beluga caviar, is considering an outright ban.
