The Long Battle for the Whales: Page 1 Endangered Species Handbook

Trade

The Long Battle for the Whales: Page 1

For more than a decade, conservation and humane organizations fought to reduce quotas set by the IWC of whales that could be killed. Gradually over the years, representatives from non-whaling countries joined the IWC and voted for lower quotas. Public opinion in most countries is solidly on the side of the whales. The fight to stop commercial whaling through decisions of the IWC was finally won when a moratorium was passed in 1982. At present, virtually all the large whales and several smaller whales have been listed on the U.S. Endangered Species Act and banned from international trade through their listing on Appendix I of CITES. Japan refused to accept the CITES listings and took reservations on most species of great whales, meaning that it gave notice it will not enforce these listings. Any country may choose to do this without losing its membership--a major CITES loophole. Today, Japan retains reservations on Baird's Beaked Whale (Berardius bairdii), Sei, Bryde's (Balaenoptera edeni), Fin, Minke and Sperm Whales, although officially it stopped importing whale meat in 1992 (Chan et al. 1995a). When the ban on commercial whaling voted by the IWC took effect in 1986, many believed that the long fight had been won. Unfortunately, whaling continued in various forms--some allowed by the IWC, and some in defiance of it. On May 19, 1992, the U.S. House of Representatives set an excellent example when it voted unanimously to pass a Resolution supporting an indefinite moratorium on whaling, stating, in part, "Whereas there is significant widespread support in the international community for the view that, for scientific, ecological, aesthetic, and educational reasons, whales should no longer be commercially hunted . . ." This Resolution did not, unfortunately, change the minds of the few nations who continue to kill whales.

Aboriginal whaling by the Inuit tribe and other native peoples has long been permitted under quota by the IWC, even for endangered species such as Bowhead and Humpback Whales. The IWC, at its 1993 meeting, called upon its Scientific Committee to investigate management regimes to govern subsistence whaling in order to minimize depletions of whale populations. Inuits in Alaska have continued whaling as a tradition--more than a need--since they have received substantial settlements from the U.S. government, and some lease their lands to oil and gas companies for high royalties. A Bowhead Whale killed in a hunt in 1996 had been stabbed by 14 harpoons and shot with countless bullets before it died (Vlessides 1998). After two days, it rose to the surface and was towed to shore, one of the few of these endangered whales to have been taken in the eastern Canadian Arctic since hunting the species without a license became illegal (Vlessides 1998). Bowhead Whale populations in the eastern Arctic had fallen from more than 10,000 to about 700 in 1996, but this hunt was to be a rebirth of an old Nunavut tradition (Vlessides 1998). The Inuit used sonar devices to search for the whale after it had been struck and shot, and they carried satellite phones. When the whale was towed to a rocky beach, 100 villagers sliced a ceremonial piece of blubber from the whale, then the hunters left and the meat was never cut. The dead Bowhead rotted on the beach, and the following spring, the community members paid to get rid of the carcass, some of which was set adrift on ice floes and the rest burned (Vlessides 1998). This whale, which might have been more than 100 years old, died a slow and painful death for no good reason.

Another Bowhead Whale was killed off the Northwest Territories in 1998, with an exploding harpoon gun. It was smaller than normal adults, only 43 feet instead of 60 feet long, and was fed on by natives of various Inuit settlements (Nickerson 1998). The International Whaling Commission condemned the hunt in a formal Resolution and implored Canada to ban it, as did many activists and conservation organizations (Nickerson 1998). In the waters where this whale was killed near Baffin Island, these whales have not rebounded in numbers from past whaling. Canada left the IWC in 1982, insisting that it is no longer a whaling nation, and defended the hunt as "sustainable" because designated communities may kill a single Bowhead every other year (Nickerson 1998). With a population of only about 7,200 worldwide, and a low population in the Canadian Arctic, any take might be more than the species can sustain. Moreover, the meat and blubber are laden with highly toxic chemicals (see below). Should the Inuit choose to let the Bowhead Whales increase without killing any of these extremely rare animals, they might come to realize that certain ancient traditions can be left behind without harming their culture.

Our knowledge of whales is only fragmentary, a science in its early stages. Research investigations are only gradually accumulating crucial data. Yet in 1974, effective in 1975, the IWC adopted the so-called "New Management Procedure" (NMP), under which whale populations were allowed to be reduced to 54 percent of their estimated original numbers. Changed somewhat, it became the "Revised Management Procedure" in the 1980s. This highly simplistic procedure is based on a lack of scientific data, including inaccurate estimates of populations and inadequate information about whale reproductive biology. Whale numbers are estimated by research vessels counting whales seen to surface, in itself a highly unscientific method resulting in "ball park" or vague estimates. First, whales spend only about 5 percent of their time on the surface. Second, estimates of original numbers, a crucial aspect to this approach, are based on records of whales killed, with guesses as to what percentage of the population these represented. Third, in order to understand the population biology of a species--its longevity, rate of reproduction, natural mortality rate, differences in survival between populations, diet, and behavior--other aspects of its life history must be known. This crucial information is lacking for every species of large whale.

A dramatic illustration of the inaccuracy of whale population estimates is that of Norway's whaling of North Atlantic Minke Whales. Norway killed an average of 3,500 Minkes a year in the North Atlantic in the mid-1950s, before cutting back to 1,800 a year until 1983 (Chadwick 2001). In Antarctic waters, Russian and Japanese whalers killed 65,000 between 1971 and 1981 (Chadwick 2001). In 1986, the year the moratorium on commercial whaling became effective, Norway, along with Japan, Peru, the U.S.S.R. and Iceland, filed objections (Bright 1991). IWC members may defy regulations merely by filing such objections. Norwegian whalers killed 383 Minke Whales in 1986 and 375 in 1987; in 1988 Norway announced it would kill whales for scientific research, which is allowed by IWC (Bright 1991).

For several years, Norway killed small numbers of whales for "scientific research" but, in 1992, resumed killing large numbers of these whales. The population estimate upon which they based their self-imposed quotas was 86,700 Minke Whales in the North Atlantic. On this basis, it killed 301 whales. Scientific estimates later revised the population number to 69,600--an enormous difference of 17,100 whales. Norway then lowered its own quota to 232, which the IWC's Scientific Committee believed to be still too high. To its credit, the IWC denounced the whaling and, at its annual meeting in 1995, passed a strongly worded Resolution against Norway. Not only did Norway begin commercial whaling in defiance of IWC resolutions, but attempts were made to smuggle the meat--mislabeled--to Japan. This scheme was uncovered, and even this blot on Norway's international reputation did not result in a change of heart regarding this slaughter. In January 2001, Norway announced that it would openly sell whale meat and blubber to Japan, breaking a long-time agreement with the United States against international sale of whale products. Japan and Norway, recently supported by Iceland, have unsuccessfully petitioned the IWC to lift the moratorium on commercial whaling and allow Minke Whales to be hunted and have attempted to ease CITES restrictions that list the species on Appendix I, banning commercial trade, also without success.

How the IWC can arrive at any quota on Minke Whales is beyond reason, since almost nothing is known about Minke Whales--not even where they mate or calve (Chadwick 2001). These elaborate population estimates are obviously totally unscientific. Minke Whales have no distinguishing characteristics that might allow them to be identified as individuals as is the case with Humpback and Right Whales. Humpback Whales have a great variety of black and white patterns on their tails, and no two are exactly alike. Northern Right Whales have callosities of various parasites, such as crustaceans, different with each whale. More than a decade has been spent by researchers working to document these individuals in the northwest Atlantic and enter the information into a database. No such research is possible as a means of counting Minke Whales.