A rum promoter’s plans to hold a shark-hunting tournament in the Dominican Republic to cull numbers has caused outrage.

Environmentalists are angered with Newton Rodriguez’s attempts to hold the March contest he hopes will help limit the number of sharks.

The Barcelo worker held a similar event after the release of 1975 shark horror film ‘Jaws’ because he felt the animals would scare away tourists.

‘It was the awakening of Dominican tourism,’ he told the Listin Diario newspaper about the previous hunt in 1976.

‘People began returning to the beach and people from all over the world began to visit us.’

Conservationists are not happy and Rafael Garcia, director of Spanish travel website Planeta Buceo, has gone a step further and started a petition, which has already garnered 1,200 names.

‘It causes us great sadness that people hunt sharks for fun and see them as an obstacle to tourism,’ he said.

The head of the Caribbean country’s Natural Resources Department Dr. Bautista Rojas Gomez said he wouldn’t allow the event to take place and added Mr Rodriguez had not sought a permit.

FROM | metro.co.uk