Section 1 Short title
This Act may be cited as the “Shark Fin Sales Elimination Act of 2017”.
Shark Fin Sales Elimination Act of 2017
A BILL
To prohibit the sale of shark fins, and for other purposes.
Sec. 2 Prohibition on sale of shark fins
Prohibition— Except as provided in section 3, no person shall possess, offer for sale, sell, or purchase any shark fin or product containing any shark fin.
Penalty— For purposes of section 308(a) of the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act (16 U.S.C. 1858(a)), a violation of this section shall be treated as an act prohibited by section 307 of that Act (16 U.S.C. 1857).
Sec. 3 Exemption for traditional fisheries, education, and science
Section 2 shall not apply with respect to possession of a shark fin that was taken lawfully under a State, territorial, or Federal license or permit to take or land sharks, if the shark fin is separated from the shark in a manner consistent with the license or permit and is—
destroyed or discarded;
used for noncommercial subsistence purposes in accordance with State or territorial law; or
used solely for display or research purposes by a museum, college, or university, or other person under a State or Federal permit to conduct noncommercial scientific research.
Sec. 4 Definitions
In this Act:
Shark— The term “shark” means any species of the orders Pristiophoriformes, Squatiniformes, Squaliformes, Hexanchiformes, Lamniformes, Carchariniformes, Orectolobiformes, and Heterodontiformes.
Shark fin— The term “shark fin” means the raw, dried, or otherwise processed detached fin, or the raw, dried, or otherwise processed detached tail, of a shark.
Sec. 5 State authority
Nothing in this Act affects any right of a State or territory of the United States to adopt or enforce any regulation or standard that is more stringent than a regulation or standard in effect under this Act.