Japan's 'research' whaling fleet set sail to the Antarctic on 13/11/04 to kill more whales in the name of 'science'. 2004 will be the 18th year of Japanese whale hunting, thinly disguised as 'scientific research'. In that time over 6,000 Antarctic Minke whales have been killed.
It has been claimed that the research is for the International Whaling Committee (IWC) but the IWC has said they do not need the data and has repeatedly asked that the programme be stopped. The waters surrounding the Antarctic were made into a whale sanctuary in 1994.
All the meat caught from Minke whales will be sold on the open market in Japan, yet the market for whale meat in Japan is dying. Only last week supermarket giant Tesco decided to remove whale meat from its Japanese stores 'due to lack of customer demand'.
The government of Japan has sanctioned whaling in defiance of an international convention for almost two decades now. The whaling fleet's departure will be the last of an 18 year programme. However, government officials have already announced that they intend to renew the hunt next year, without waiting for a scientific review of the current programme.
"The Japanese government should stop calling for the resumption of commercial whaling and should stop calling this expedition 'research'," said Willie Mackenzie Greenpeace Oceans campaigner. "The data the Japanese government is collecting is not requested by the IWC. If they truly want to conduct research they can do so without killing thousands of whales".
Mackenzie continued: "World-wide, whales face a huge range of threats to their survival because of humanity; pollution, climate change and entanglement in nets. Commercial hunting under the guise of science is the one threat to whale populations that we can end immediately."
Surveys over the last decade have found less than half the number of Antarctic Minke whales estimated in previous studies The IWC has withdrawn its population estimate for the species and is trying to develop a new one.
A legitimate scientific study published last week (1) found that krill has declined by 80 percent since the 1970s in some waters within the Antarctic whale sanctuary threatening the food supply of whales as well as seals and penguins.
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NOTES: (1) Long-term decline in krill stock and increase in salps within the Southern Ocean: Atkinson, Siegel, Pakhomov & Rothery - "Nature" 4th Nov 2004.
