Over half the 550 whales killed in 2007 were pregnant females, according to the International Humane Society (IHS)

Over Easter it was announced that the Japanese whaling fleet had only achieved 68% of its target of killing 950 Minke whales ands 50 Fin whales, ‘for research purposes.’ Activist groups such as Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society and Greenpeace were cited as playing a key role in disrupting the hunt – or saving the lives of up to 300 harmless mammals, depending on how you look at it. Sea Shepherd, in particular, has been particularly daring and aggressive in its confrontations with the Japanese fishing fleet over the past few months. Captain Paul Watson and his crew regularly sailed across the bows of fishing vessels, boarded ships, sprayed foul-smelling chemicals at crew and were shot at and wounded in return. operations were suspended when it was alleged and rumoured that the Japanese were sending their Navy to ‘defend’ the trawler fleet against the Sea Shepherd. Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith had expressed dismay that whaling had resumed in the Southern Oceans. Australia had designated a section of the ocean a whale sanctuary. His Japanese counterpart, Masahiko Komura, refuses to recognise the protected region and defended his country’s right to kill whales and condemned ‘harassment’ on the part of Sea Shepherd and others.

The International Whaling Commission declared a moratorium on commercial whaling in 1986, when it became clear that several species were in imminent danger of extinction. Icelandic and Canadian Inuit fishermen claim that their traditional livelihoods depend upon whaling, but their methods are generally in stark contrast to the technologies employed by the commercial ‘scientific’ fleets. In the Northern hemisphere, the Common Minke Whale has recovered to an estimated 103,000 population. Norway famously opposed the ban and has probably killed the most Minke whales since 1993, inexplicably so, since it is one of the world’s and certainly the northern hemisphere’s richest countries due to its oil stocks. It has no need of 1000 or so Minke corpses. The Antarctic Minke population has been estimated as high as 650,000, but the Blue Whale population, which fell to an estimated 600 in 1974, still only stands at 5000. There are less than 16,000 Right Whales in the world’s oceans. Despite the continued moratorium on Humpback Whales, hunted to within 10% of extinction by the 1960s, but now with an estimated population of 60,000, Japan intended to kill 50 specimens this year, but abandoned plans after pressure from the International Whaling Commission.

Commercial whaling is not the sole reason for the decline in the world’s whale population, but, like 19th Century buffalo hunting, unregulated commercial over-hunting led to the virtual extinction of several cetacean species in the past. Several species are still in grave danger: ther are Nowadays there is no real commercial reason to hunt whales, which were sought after in the past primarily for oil, bone and meat. Though there is a compelling case to allow hunting in ‘traditional’ native communities – a similar argument applies to traditional, as opposed to factory fishing – it is equally true that subsistence fishermen do not tend to use radar, GPS and explosive harpoons to stalk and destroy their targets. The hypocrisy of the ‘scientific’ explanation for Japan’s insistence upon its right to kill whales is partly explained by the taxonomy which the International Whaling Commission adopted to glissando round a practice which the civilised world finds generally repugnant. Japan sees the right to hunt whales as an unalienable aspect of its culture, as do Iceland, Norway and certain Caribbean islanders, for example. Yet the Japanese Foreign Minister complained earlier this year that debating the issue on ‘emotional’ terms acted to obscure the argument.

The issue of whale hunting, and ‘big game’ hunting in general, is ultimately emotional and certainly moral, involving as it does the right of man to prey on other species, an activity in which every carnivore engages to a greater or lesser extent, but for pleasure – or ‘science’ – as opposed to subsistence. However, there is an immense difference between managed husbandry and untrammelled hunting, especially of animals for which there is no real demand, and it is unscientific in the extreme to pretend otherwise. Several species of sharks, for example, have been hunted close to extinction on the unfounded pretext that they are dangerous to man.

The whaling moratorium has led to substantial increases in whale populations, and should be seen as a beacon of hope for the world’s endangered fish stocks, particularly cod, haddock and herring. Factory fishing has decimated these populations in the North Atlantic. Only a complete and lasting moratorium over a ten year period will serve to replenish stocks to sustainable levels. Side arguments such as the effects of pollution and climate change should not stand in the way of a ‘scientific’ conclusion that conservation and restraint works. A cod, haddock or flounder is not a mammal, and is in no way anthropomorphic or evocative, but we need Sea Shepherds to stand up for the rights of our wet fish too, not to mention tuna, shrimp and the complex food chain which depends upon these species.

John J Kelly