The most accurate assessment yet of the impact of commercial fishing on sharks suggests about 100 million are killed each year.
The researchers say that this rate of exploitation far too high, especially for species that reproduce later in life.
The main factor driving the trade is continued demand for shark fins for soup in Chinese communities.
The report has been published in the journal Marine Policy.
The researchers acknowledged that the establishment of the true level of global shark fishing is extremely difficult, as the poor quality of the data. Many sharks are caught for their fins removed at sea with the body dumped in the sea. Often these are not included in the official reports of fish.
Margin fin
However, scientists estimate a mortality of between 63 and 273 million sharks in 2010.
"There is a very large group and it speaks to the quality of the data, which is not great," said Dr. Demian Chapman of Stony Brook University in New York, United States.
"Certainly 100 million is an estimate of the average and this is the best estimate of there," he added.
While the number of sharks being caught has not changed much between 2000 and 2010, the authors of the research argue that commercial fishing fleets are simply change the location and types of sharks they target in order to keep up with the demand. The fear is that eventually these shark species will crash.
Fueling concern is the fact that many of the species that are most threatened too slow to reproduce.
"There are a lot of sharks, which are prized in the trade takes more than a decade to reach maturity," said Dr. Chapman.
"There is a level of really very narrowly mortality of sharks that can be encountered before the path becomes negative population - and this is really what was happening.
"They are not fast enough to keep up with the rate of reproduction we pulled out of the ocean," he added.
The engine was the largest shark fishing demand for shark fin soup, a product that is seen as a luxury commodity among Chinese communities.
While still being cut shark fins at sea off, many countries, including Canada, the United States and the European Union have tried to restrict by law.
But this has not had the desired effect, explained Dr. Chapman.
"The problem is that the valuable fins so that now people do not 'finning' sharks in the sea - they're keeping everything. But it is still dead, has finning ban did not stop the root of the problem."
On Sunday, negotiators from 178 countries gather in Bangkok for the meeting of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). There are proposals to regulate trade in five of the most endangered species of sharks.
At a previous meeting in 2010, down similar restrictions just short of the two-thirds majority required. This time, activists say they enjoy widespread support among developed and developing countries and are optimistic that they will be able to mobilize the required votes....
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