Japan Begins Cruel Whale Hunt Again

Nov. 19th, 2008

The clock is ticking for whales this week as the Japanese ready their harpoons for the five-month long whaling season during which they will kill hundreds of whales in the waters of the Southern Antarctic Ocean -- an IWC-designated whale sanctuary.

Last year, Japan killed 551 minke whales in the Antarctic, well below the country's self-allotted quota. This year Japan plans to kill more than 900 minke whales and 50 fin whales in the sanctuary. There were press statements that Japan, for a number of valid reasons, including lack of market demand for whale meat, was going to reduce its hunt this year by about 20 percent. Japan denied the press reports, saying it had every intention of taking the full quota. In the same week of denying a more moderate stance by reducing its kill quota, Japan announced that it has granted an import license for more than 65 tons of whale meat which has been sitting in customs since it was sent there from Iceland and Norway last summer.

Some of this whale meat will be served in schools and sold to restaurants and other vendors, while most of the meat will go unused and stored in a warehouse in order to keep alive the cruel, unnecessary and outdated practice of killing whales.

"Japan, though bound by the moratorium on commercial whaling passed by the IWC in 1982, continues to kill whales by exploiting a provision in the 1946 International Convention on the Regulation of Whaling that allows a government to kill whales for scientific research," said Kitty Block, vice president for Humane Society International. "By claiming its whaling is for research, Japan has been able to kill more than 15,000 whales since the moratorium was implemented in 1986."

Moreover, studies have shown that much of the whale meat sold in Japanese markets contains high levels of contaminants such methyl mercury. Also, whale meat consumption only became widespread in Japan after World War II, when food was scarce. Now, with risks to both human health and whale populations, there is no need to carry on this inhumane and unnecessary practice that causes the cruel death of hundreds of whales every year, according to HSI.

Scientists Find Whales Innocent of Global Decline in Fisheries

The argument that great whales are behind declining fish stocks has absolutely no scientific foundation, according to leading researchers and members of conservation organizations who spoke at the International Whaling Commission's 60th meeting today in Santiago, Chile.

In its opening day, representatives from Humane Society International, World Wildlife Fund and the Lenfest Ocean Program presented three reports debunking the science behind "whales-eat-fish" claims often made by whaling nations Japan, Norway and Iceland. Such arguments have been used to bolster support for whaling, particularly from developing nations.

"It is not the whales, it is overfishing and excess fishing capacity that are responsible for diminishing supplies of fish in developing countries," said fisheries biologist Dr. Daniel Pauly, director of the University of British Columbia Fisheries Centre. "Making whales into scapegoats serves only to benefit wealthy whaling nations while harming developing nations by distracting any debate on the real causes of the declines of their fisheries."

Who's eating all the fish? The food security rationale for culling cetaceans examines the final destination of catches from coastal fisheries in the South Pacific, Caribbean and West Africa. Less than half the catch goes to domestic markets and the majority of the catch supplies markets of affluent countries in the European Union, Japan, North America and, increasingly, China. "One can speak of fish migrating from the more needy to the less needy," the report states.

Also presented to the IWC Scientific Committee were the preliminary results from an analysis of the interaction between whales and commercial fisheries in Northwest Africa. The modeling, supported by the Lenfest Ocean Program, shows no real competition between local or foreign fisheries and great whales.

The great whales spend only a few months in the area during their vast seasonal migrations, eat relatively little while breeding and tend to consume fundamentally different types of food resources than the marine species targeted by both local and foreign fisheries. When models are designed which presume that whales are eating species important to the fishing industry, those models still fail to show that great whales are a significant source of competition to fishing, the report concluded.

Also released today is a review of the scientific literature originating from Japan and Norway, the two countries most strongly promoting the idea that whales pose problems for fisheries. The review, funded by WWF, found significant flaws in much of the science and concluded that "where good data are available, there is no evidence to support the contention that whale predation presents an ecological issue for fisheries."

Dr. Susan Lieberman of WWF said, "These three reports provide yet more conclusive evidence that great whales are not responsible for the degraded state of the world's fisheries. It is now time for governments to focus on the real reason for fisheries decline — unsustainable fishing operations."

Patricia Forkan, president of Humane Society International, said, "Dr. Pauly's findings should refute, once and for all, the misconception that whales are eating all the fish and need to be killed to protect the world's fisheries."

Resources:
HSI
International Whaling Commission