Japan a Step Closer to Commercial Whaling

Anti-whaling nations clung to slim victories on all but one crucial declaration after a week of tight voting at the International Whaling Commission (IWC) meeting on Caribbean Island, St Kitts & Nevis last week.

Japan snuck in a symbolic victory for pro-whaling nations by winning a 33 to 32 vote in a bid to overturn a moratorium on commercial whaling, claiming whale numbers have replenished and whales are responsible for fisheries depletion.

A claim, Greenpeace says, is absurd, "We say the idea of whales being responsible for fisheries depletion is the equivalent of blaming woodpeckers for deforestation," International Greenpeace spokesperson Mike Townsley said.

Although the pro-whaling bloc, led by Japan, Norway and Iceland need a 75 percent majority vote to end the twenty-year moratorium, the latest voting has raised many questions for conservation groups and anti-whaling countries.

"The declaration was about as extreme as it could be and the fact that a simple majority of the IWC would vote for it is a wake up call to the world that whales are no longer safe," says NZ Conservation Minister, Chris Carter.

"New Zealand will have to redouble its efforts to ensure Japan's majority does not become a permanent fixture. Public opinion around the world must be mobilised."

Current whaling

Japan carries out extensive whaling under the banner of 'scientific research', as does Iceland, and Norway ignores the moratorium altogether.

Japan caught 850 minke whales in the Antarctic in its last whaling season, and 10 fin whales, which conservationists say are endangered. It has announced plans to hunt around 50 fins and humpbacks a year. The meat ends up in restaurants and sushi bars.

Norway resumed commercial hunts of minke whales in 1993, ignoring the IWC moratorium. Norway's whalers have a quota of 1,052 of the cetaceans for 2006. The meat is eaten as steaks.

Iceland resumed whaling in 2003 when it caught 36 minke whales for scientific research. It cut the quota to 25 in 2004 and caught the same number in 2005.

In the past two decades more than 24,000 whales have been killed and Japan threatens that 'real change is soon to come.'

Norwegian and Icelandic prime ministers welcomed the recommendation by the IWC to relax a ban on commercial whaling.

"This is positive and goes in our favour," Icelandic Prime Minister Geir Haarde told a news conference. "It supports the rightful development of using natural resources," he said.

These three countries have announced a plan to increase their total current kill of 2,395 whales a year to 3,215 by 2008, saying many species have rebounded sufficiently to sustain a commercial whaling.

Cruelty of killing

Animal welfare groups believe the cruelty of modern whaling is key to maintaining the moratorium, backed last week by an unprecedented 13 anti-whaling countries who expressed serious concern about the cruelty of whale hunting.

Leah Garces, of the Whalewatch Coalition and spokesperson for the World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA) said, "Scientific evidence presented this year confirms that there is no humane way to kill a whale at sea and, therefore, that all commercial and so-called scientific whaling should cease on cruelty grounds alone."

She said evidence proves that inaccuracy is unavoidable when trying to hit a partially submerged animal from a moving vessel.

With such low accuracy the result is inevitably a prolonged and painful death for whales.

The situation is amplified in the Antarctic where sea conditions are even more unfavourable.

Norway and Japan's data claims that 1 in 5 of whales in Norway and 2 in 5 of whales in Japan do not die instantaneously, with some taking over an hour to die.

2007 campaigns

Both camps will now be mounting their campaigns for next years IWC meet in Anchorage, Alaska, where Mr Carter says, "Japan have the potential to cause lots of other problems."

"For example, they could abolish, by a simple majority, the Conservation Committee, which is very important because it focuses on providing opportunity for small island nations to develop eco-tourism and promotes whale conservation measures."

The Fisheries Agency of Japan, on the other hand, claims that whales eat fish and are a threat to food security of coastal communities. Although, Antarctic fin whales don't eat fish and neither do southern hemisphere minke (the other species hunted off the coast of Antarctica).

In addition, the Japanese always promote the idea of secret ballots – which only needs a simple majority to overturn.

"They're desperate to get that in," says Carter. Secret ballots would lose accountability in the IWC, which Carter believes would, "reduce the IWC to an even worse image."

New Zealand will be encouraging anti-whaling countries who have let their membership lapse such as Kenya, Costa Rica and Peru to pay their dues. And recruitment is underway for more anti-whaling nations to join the IWC, such as Croatia and Cypress.

Vote buying

Environmentalists in Japan say the push to overturn the moratorium is backed by a group of nationalist politicians who have plunged more than $164 million in public money in the last six years into a handful of Caribbean nations, despite indifference at home to whaling.

Reportedly, an internet survey released last week asserted that more than 70 percent of Japanese people oppose a return to commercial whaling and is eaten regularly by less than one-per cent of the population.

New Zealand and Pacific fallout

New Zealand will be scrutinising its relationships with six Pacific nations after the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu, Kiribati, Nauru, Marshall Islands and Palau all voted with Japan.

"The relationship between New Zealand and the Pacific Islands is very important, it's very close because of our large Pacific community in New Zealand. So, upsetting us is probably something they don't like doing," said Conservation Minister, Chris Carter.

Mr Carter was positive about a basis to work as the Pacific Island countries will be "a bit concerned" that our Prime Minister and her Australian counterpart were so critical of their behaviour.

"Pacific nations will be quite embarrassed, particularly the Solomon Islands, whose PM said on Radio NZ International they would be not supporting Japan, they'd be abstaining."

Summer campaign

Greenpeace will be down in the Southern Ocean again this summer acting as the "cops of the ocean." They will be joined by the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, who also plan to return to the Whale Sanctuary of Antarctica in December.

Concerned New Zealander's can be rest assured that, "The whaling fleet is never allowed to stop in New Zealand, we'd never allow it," according to Chris Carter.

"I have long supported Greenpeace's campaign in the Southern Ocean, as long as it's peaceful and in my view, up until this point it has been. I'm very positive about them going."