Fifth of freshwater African species are threatened with extinction

[ajm1961]

Sad article I found on Yahoo...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20100902/sc_afp/environmentbiodiversityspeciesiucn

And here's the news release from the IUCN:
http://www.iucnredlist.org/news/african-freshwater-species-threatened-livelihoods-at-stake

As hobbyists, are we helping preserve species, or encouraging exportation and extinction?
Very serious situation...
What's your take?

[robt18]

I think the majority of the time with african cichlids they stand a better chance in captivity than in the wild. For the species that are so rare that they are close to being extinct in the wild, the only people who are going to buy them are serious hobbyists who are likely going to breed them. Africans typically aren't that difficult to breed, so they have a pretty good chance of being preserved in captivity.

An ethical issue that I could see arising is the availability of fish for food in africa. A lot of the people there rely on cichlids as a food source. However I don't see this becoming an issue, as the article says 1/5 of species are threatened, which means the availability of food for the fish in the lakes likely hasn't diminished significantly, and the more plentiful fish may in fact thrive with smaller numbers of the other fish.

One thing to remember is that regulations aren't really enforced around the lakes.... if they made certain species protected it would likely just drive the price up on the species and make it that much more attractive to export. It may in fact push the species closer to extinction in the wild. It may be for the best to allow 'nature' to take its course and hope they are successfully bred captively to keep them around for as long as we can.