The increase number of turtles in Pakistani shores is the result of a law passed by sindh government in 1979 to protect the endangered species. The government’s intention was to protect the Green and Olive Ridley turtles, which have been usually found along the Sindh and Balochistan coastline since 1972. The Sindh Wildlife Department started working on conservation and campaigns in 1979 and according to its records, the number of turtles along the Karachi coast is slowly increasing.
Deputy conservator Fehmida Firdous said that the number of turtles increased after over 0.7 million turtles were released in the sea in the last three decades. She added that the number of female turtles that come to the sandy shores to lay eggs has considerably increased. It is true that commercial trade and sea development hinder conservation efforts. But by far, increasing coastal development is the biggest threat, says Firdous.
Dr Babar Hussain of Sindh Wetlands Centre said that the centre and WWF Pakistan have been trying to protect their habitat and closely monitoring the Sandspit and Hawkes Bay beaches and released 2,250 hatchlings in the sea in 2001. Dr Firdous believes that 1,000 is still not a sustainable figure. She told that there is a need of at least 2,000 turtles on the shore to allow any sort of trade or hunting,” she said, pointing out that turtle trade is a lucrative business.
Tahir Qureshi, a marine scientist at the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), Pakistan, added that catching turtles in fishing nets also stunts the growth of their population. The wildlife department has already started a new project, ‘Protection and Conservation of Marine Turtles at Karachi and Keti Bunder’, over the last year.
