Japan is harpooning itself in the foot

With many whales are still endangered, Tokyo’s move is depressing — and has no economic justification, writes The Observer.

WHALES have been hunted by humans for thousands of years. Their flesh, oil and blubber have been variously employed for food, to make wax for candles and to provide fuel for lamps. This kind of exploitation is no longer needed today. Modern society gets its protein and its lighting from other, more accessible sources. Hence the decision by the International Whaling Commission (IWC) to place a moratorium on commercial whaling in 1986.

Given that many species had already been brought close to extinction, the move was long overdue. Three decades later, the blue whale, the humpback whale and many other great cetaceans are still struggling to rise out of the critically endangered state. Had whaling not been halted 30 years ago, many of these great creatures would no longer be swimming in our oceans.

Given this worrying background, it is all the more difficult to understand the announcement by the government of Japan that it has decided that it will leave the IWC in June in order to resume commercial whaling the following month. By any standards, the move is depressing — and alarming. It has no economic or ecological justification and in preparing to slaughter some of the planet’s most intelligent creatures for food the plan is repugnant.

Not surprisingly, governments, scientists and wildlife groups across the planet have made clear their deep disgust at Japan’s proposed actions. Britain, Australia and New Zealand have all admonished its leaders while the conservation group the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) rightly criticised Tokyo for acting as it has done.

An examination of the motives of Japan’s leaders is equally disquieting. In the past, the nation has provided itself with whale meat by exploiting a loophole in the IWC rule book. This permits ‘‘scientific whaling’’ in international waters, in particular the South Atlantic. As a result, hundreds of whales have been caught there every year in the name of cetacean research. However, these South Atlantic hunts have generated a great deal of criticism from other nations and wildlife groups. By moving, instead, into its own national waters, which stretch across an area roughly equivalent to the size of India, Japan clearly hopes to do much more of its whaling on the quiet.

It remains to be seen if this move will succeed. It is also unclear if the current generation of Japanese consumers is that interested in whale meat. In the 1960s, almost a quarter of a million tonnes were sold across Japan, a figure that has fallen to around 3000. Much of the meat from Japan’s ‘‘scientific whaling’’ now ends up as pet food.

Nor is it clear how much consumers will be prepared to pay for whale meat. Japan’s ‘‘scientific whaling’’ trips were subsidised by its government. It is not yet obvious if their replacements — commercial whaling hunts inside national waters — will get support from government coffers. If not, whale meat will become even more expensive, a prospect that has led specialist restaurant operators to express worries about sharp price rises. Thus Japan will have earned itself intense global opprobrium without bringing itself any benefits at all. It will have harpooned itself in the foot. At least that is the outcome Japan deserves and which most of the planet will now be anticipating. — Guardian News and Media