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Efforts to mitigate threats posed to marine mammals require place-based management measures in the areas that are most important for their life processes, including feeding, reproducing, migrating and resting.

Wildlife trafficking rise has been supported by the world's increasingly interconnected systems of finance, communication and transport, which have brought once isolated source regions to remote areas closer and closer to large demand markets in North America, Europe and Asia. This trafficking was once thought to be largely confined to Africa and Asia, wildlife trafficking has become increasingly prevalent all over the world and now ranking behind only drugs, humans and arms trafficking as the most valuable type of international organized crime estimated by annual value.

Shark and ray numbers are declining globally, and a quarter of all species are believed to be threatened with extinction.

Concerns for the future of sharks and rays have been growing for some time. In 1999, an International Plan of Action for the Conservation and Management of Sharks (IPOA) was adopted.