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  The New Paper, 1 Jul 05
This S'porean moved Disney to say no

MICKEY mouse was brought to his knees, thanks to a bespectacled 49-year-old Singaporean who doesn't eat fish.

Mr Michael Aw, who is at the forefront of the battle against eating shark's fin, scored a big victory last week when Disney scratched the dish from the menu of its soon-to-be-opened theme park in Hong Kong. The billion-dollar theme park admitted it could not find an 'environmentally sustainable' source for the fins.

A jubilant Mr Aw congratulated Disney for the decision, saying the controversy turned out to be a boon because 'never before have sharks received such global attention' regarding the fin trade.

The former advertising man, who used to do ad campaigns for companies like Singapore Casket, told AFP that serving the dish will sound the death knell for the 'Ferraris of the ocean'. The fins are usually hacked off captured live sharks, which are dumped back into the sea where they bleed to death or get eaten.

He called upon the Disney group to 'develop an alliance' with 'like-minded individuals and institutions' to discourage eating shark's fin.

The Sydney-based conservationist now makes a living as an underwater photographer, author and publisher when he's not leading ecological tours in the Galapagos Islands and Antarctica.

He heads a 'Say no to shark's fin' educational campaign here and in Malaysia, and hopes to recruit 10,000 young ambassadors for sharks in Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan and China by 2007.

TOUGH WORK

But working against the mindset that serving shark's fin is a sign of wealth is tough. Environmentally-conscious newlyweds find it hard to avoid serving the dish at wedding dinners and risk their families losing face.

But at Mr Aw's wedding in 1996, he demanded that the dish be taken off the menu. And whenever he is served shark's fin soup at dinners, he will politely decline and 'give a short spiel' on the trade's cruelty.

'In fact, in Chinese culture, cruelty begets ill fortune, bad luck and a sentence to hell after death!'

But he makes a small concession. 'I don't eat fish, but do enjoy crabs.'
links
More about Michael Aw and his conservation work on his Ocean Environment website and his photography site
Related articles on sharks' fins
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