Iceland to resume whaling

[Guest guest]

By BBC News Online's environment correspondent Alex Kirby

Iceland says it will resume commercial whaling, perhaps as soon as next

year.

 

Last month it rejoined the International Whaling Commission (IWC), which

since 1986 has observed a moratorium on commercial whaling.

 

Iceland says it will hunt minkes and probably also fin and sei whales off

its coasts.

 

And as Icelanders have lost the habit of eating whalemeat, it looks likely

to export most of its catch.

 

Fish stocks

 

The Icelandic ambassador in London, Thorsteinn Palsson, told BBC News

Online: " Our policy is to resume whaling on a sustainable basis.

 

" Our parliament has already taken the decision, but the government will

decide the timing. The decision won't come this year, I'm sure.

 

" We'll hunt minkes and probably also fins and seis - these stocks are in

great abundance in our waters, and growing fast.

 

" It's important to preserve a balance in the ecosystem, so one reason for

our decision is the need to conserve fish stocks. Scientists have estimated

that if we don't start the hunt again, the whales could reduce our cod

stocks by 20%.

 

" I emphasise strongly that we are talking only about a sustainable and

limited catch. "

 

Second largest

 

Mr Palsson could give no estimate of the likely numbers of whales to be

caught, but said the hunt would be restricted to within 315 kilometres (200

miles) of Iceland's coast, because it had no historic experience of whaling

beyond there.

 

Minkes are thought to be relatively abundant globally, with upwards of

500,000 animals in the Antarctic.

 

There is debate about the size of the North Atlantic population that Iceland

will be hunting.

 

The fin whale is the second largest animal on Earth, next in size to the

very rare blue whale. It can grow to more than 26 metres (80 feet) in

maturity, and globally is believed to number more than 100,000.

 

The sei whale can reach 16 m (50 ft) in length, and the global population is

thought to be about 50,000.

 

Export market

 

Mr Palsson told BBC News Online: " All our fisheries decisions are strictly

science-based. When the government decides to go ahead, that will be on the

basis of what the scientists say.

 

" We haven't caught any whales for 15 years now, so people in Iceland don't

eat whalemeat any more, though they used to. We used to export part of the

catch, mainly to Japan, though it's too early to say whether we might do so

again.

 

" We know the IWC moratorium is in force, but we don't consider ourselves

bound by it, because we registered an objection against it when we rejoined

the Commission in June. So we believe we can be IWC members and yet go back

to commercial whaling. "

 

The IWC holds its annual meeting in London from 23 July, and there will

again be pressure for the lifting of the moratorium from the two other

members that continue to kill whales, Norway and Japan.

 

Norway is not bound by the moratorium because it objected to it when it was

introduced. It catches around 500 North Atlantic minkes a year, and has

resumed exports to Japan.

 

The Japanese fleet catches minkes in the Antarctic, and has also killed

sperm and Bryde's whales in the North Pacific. It does this by virtue of an

IWC regulation which allows any member state to kill unlimited numbers of

any whale species in the name of scientific research.