Guest guest Posted April 3, 2002 Report Share Posted April 3, 2002 http://www2.swissinfo.org/sen/Swissinfo.html?siteSect=143 & eid=1089593 Japan pro-whalers step up campaign By Elaine Lies TOKYO (Reuters) - With the slogan " Save Them, Eat Them " , a Japanese campaign to end the ban on commercial whaling is gearing up just weeks before the annual International Whaling Commission (IWC) meeting opens in Japan. Japan agrees with protecting endangered species but argues that others, like the minke whale, are in no danger of dying out and hunting within limits should be allowed. Along with fellow whaler Norway it has long pushed for the resumption of commercial whaling, and the always-touchy issue is likely to be especially contentious this year because Japan recently said it would expand its research whaling programme. As banners reading " Support the Resumption of Commercial Whaling " and " Fight On, Japan " snapped in a warm spring breeze, officials and politicians gathered on Tuesday to cheer the departure of a promotional caravan on a tour of western Japan before the IWC meeting starts in the southwestern city of Shimonoseki in May. Japan, which abandoned commercial whaling in 1986 to comply with an IWC moratorium, has roused international ire by carrying out what it calls scientific research whaling since 1987. Critics charge that much of the meat ends up on restaurant tables. Whale meat was an important source of protein in an impoverished Japan after World War Two but is no longer widely eaten, becoming instead a gourmet item. A fisheries official recently said that Japan intended to press at the IWC meeting for the resumption of commercial whaling with conditions -- a stance echoed on Tuesday. " Since we stopped commercial whaling, the number of whales has really increased, " Noriyoshi Hattori, a director at the Japan Whaling Association, told the gathering. " At the IWC meeting we hope to make progress towards lifting the ban. " IWC UNDER FIRE Others slammed the IWC for becoming too " ideological " and shifting from its original role as a group that once managed whaling and now appears to stand in its way -- a view shared by other whaling nations. " They aren't obeying international treaties, " said Kunio Yonezawa, the leader of a similar promotional tour of northern Japan. " They aren't listening to international scientists, and they aren't even keeping their own promises. " Japan last month roused anger among conservationists when it said it would catch sei whales, said by conservationists to be endangered, as part of its research whaling programme this year. Under a proposal submitted to the IWC for approval, Japan's research fleet in the Northwest Pacific plans to catch 150 minke whales, a rise of 50 from last year. It also plans to take 50 Bryde's whales, 50 sei whales and 10 sperm whales. Japan has long argued that it does not make sense for non-whaling nations to protest against catching minke whales, whose population is estimated at one million worldwide. It also says that whales are consuming vast amounts of fish, leading to a worldwide drop in fisheries production. Japan's fish landings have halved to six million tonnes in the last 20 years. Environmentalists argue the drop in fish landings is the result of overfishing and that whales have little to do with it. The chances of the ban being lifted in Shimonoseki in May are remote. Japan has been voted down on many previous occasions. Public opinion in Japan seems divided. A recent survey by the daily Asahi Shimbun found that 47 percent of Japanese favoured the resumption of commercial whaling while 36 percent opposed it. Some 60 percent of respondents in their twenties said they were against it. 02.04.2002 11:00, Reuters ======================= http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1907000/1907036.stm Tuesday, 2 April, 2002, 16:47 GMT 17:47 UK Japan green group softens on whaling Pressure is growing for at least some whaling to start again By Alex Kirby BBC News Online environment correspondent A Japanese conservation group is reported to be backing a resumption of commercial whaling. The group, WWF-Japan, is quoted as supporting a partial lifting of the hunting moratorium in force since 1985. It said the hunting should be closely monitored, and should be restricted to abundant species. Japanese supporters of whaling are campaigning for the moratorium to be lifted completely at an international conference next month. Key conference WWF-Japan is reported to have said: " If the population dynamics of whale stocks are accurately understood, if sustainable quotas are carefully calculated... and if an enforceable and effective revised management procedure (RMS) is completed, we can no longer deny the logic that regulated commercial whaling can be resumed. " The RMS is a scheme devised by the International Whaling Commission (IWC), designed to safeguard whale stocks. Protestors say whaling should end Shigeki Komori of WWF-Japan said any future whaling would have to be monitored by the IWC, which is due to hold its annual meeting in the Japanese city of Shimonoseki in May. Supporters of whaling hope the meeting will agree to lift the moratorium, but all the signs are that it will survive for another year at least. The statement from WWF-Japan was reported by two international news agencies, but the group has complained that its remarks were taken out of context and that it was misquoted. A statement from WWF-UK said: " WWF does not support commercial whaling. This position... is shared by the entire WWF international network, including WWF-Japan. " Last July Gordon Shepherd, director of the international policy unit at WWF's global HQ in Switzerland, said limited whaling might be the only way to prevent a free-for-all. Research imperative He told BBC News Online: " The message 'Just say no' hasn't worked with drugs, and it isn't working with whales. " As a conservationist, I say: 'Don't whale'. But that's not working. If the IWC can't stop whaling, it has to control it. " Whale numbers are uncertain Japan has been catching whales for some years, despite the moratorium, as part of a research programme. This is allowed under the IWC's rules, which permit an unlimited catch of any whale species in the name of science. Japan's critics say the sale of the whales' meat for human consumption shows the research is simply a stratagem, though the Japanese say they are obliged by the IWC to sell the meat to avoid waste. Expanded catch Last year Japan caught about 440 minke whales in the Antarctic, where it says there are about 760,000 minkes, the smallest of the great whales. The IWC thinks the number could be appreciably smaller. In the north Pacific this year Japan plans to catch 150 minkes, 10 sperm whales, 50 sei and 50 Bryde's whales. It says the stocks are big enough to sustain catches of this size, though its critics are unconvinced. The only other country to continue whaling is Norway, which is not bound by the moratorium because it objected to it when it was agreed by the IWC. ================ http://hoovnews.hoovers.com/fp.asp?layout=displaynews & doc_id=NR200203301680. 2_5541000a52558a64 New Japanese Poll Confirms: Whale Not on the Menu - Asahi Shimbun Survey March 30, 2002 5:30pm Results at Odds with Government Spin, Reports IFAW TOKYO, March 30 /PRNewswire/ -- An overwhelming majority of Japanese citizens have either never eaten whale meat or have not eaten it for a very long time, according to poll results released today by the national Asahi Shimbun newspaper. The findings, for which Asahi's polling division conducted face-to-face interviews with 3000 persons, contradict government research results recently promoted by the Japanese Fisheries Agency. Pro-whaling bureaucrats have cited the government research in recent weeks, alleging strong support from the Japanese public for a return to commercial whaling. According to the new survey, a scant four percent of the nationally representative group say they sometimes eat whale. 53% claim only to have eaten whale only " a long time ago " , and 33% say they have never eaten whale products. Less than half of the respondents (47%) say they would support a return to commercial whaling, among these a plurality (22%) said their support depended on the recovery of whale stocks. Respondents opposed to whaling cited the special status of whales as wild creatures, lack of a need for whale meat and international criticism as the top three reasons Japan should not resume full-scale commercial whaling. The new poll results come two months before the International Whaling Commission (IWC) convenes its annual meeting in Shimonoseki, Japan and are perceived as a blow to government bureaucrats who have launched a massive propaganda effort to bolster support for whaling among the Japanese public. A Japanese government sponsored poll on whaling released earlier this month by the Japan Fisheries Agency had been heavily criticized internationally. New Zealand and Austrailan government Ministers have been the most sharply critical of the Japanese Government line. Australian Environment Minister Dr. David Kemp expressed concern that the recent government poll seemed, " to have been designed not so much to gauge public opinion as to advertise the Japanese Government's policy. " Conservationists agreed: " Perhaps the only thing they are torturing more than whales are their polling numbers, " said Fred O'Regan, President of the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW-www.ifaw.org). " These new findings pretty much blow the arguments of the Fisheries Agency bureaucrats out of the water, " O'Regan said. The Asahi Shimbun poll is consistent with credible research done over the past several years by respected research agencies in Japan including an extensive survey conducted by the Nippon Research Center in December 1999, which found similar results. For more information visit www.ifaw.org . MAKE YOUR OPINION COUNT - Click Here http://tbutton.prnewswire.com/prn/11690X68818969 ================== http://portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2002/03/31/wdolph31. xml & sSheet=/news/2002/03/31/ixworld.html Dolphins slaughtered as cocaine smugglers take to tuna fishing By Jonathan Russell and David Harrison (Filed: 31/03/2002) TENS of thousands of dolphins are being slaughtered by Latin American gangs using the fishing industry as cover for smuggling cocaine into the United States and on to other countries, including Britain. US anti-narcotics officers acknowledge that crime syndicates in Colombia and Mexico have bought up tuna fleets and canneries in South and Central America. The boats are used to transport the cocaine - known as " white tuna " - and the fishing companies provide a means of laundering the profits. Ben White, the international co-ordinator of the Washington-based Animal Welfare Institute, said that the gangs used fishing methods most countries had banned because of the disastrous effect they have on dolphins and porpoises. " The drug cartels don't care how they catch the tuna so they don't fish in a dolphin-friendly way, " he said. One technique involves dropping stun grenades from a helicopter on to dolphins as they follow shoals of tuna. The grenades concuss the marine life. Entire schools of dolphin can die as fishermen pull the tuna on board in nets. In recent years, the gangs have bought up entire fishing fleets and now have hundreds of boats based in Latin America. The practice was alluded to in the Steven Soderbergh film about the drugs trade, Traffic, starring Michael Douglas, Catherine Zeta Jones and Benicio Del Torro. Mr White said: " The boats allow the cartels to carry thousands of tons of cocaine between countries under the guise of a legitimate business and, in the process, they have killed millions of dolphins. " Three months ago, the Mexican navy, assisted by the US Coast Guard Law Enforcement Detachment, seized its largest cocaine haul - on board a tuna fishing trawler, the 180ft Macel. The boat was loaded with 10 tons of cocaine, with a street value of about £210 million, hidden under several tons of yellow-fin tuna. The 19 crew members were arrested and are awaiting trial in Mexico. Mr White said that the worst-hit area was the eastern tropical Pacific, a triangular area between San Diego, Costa Rica and Hawaii. Latin American tuna fishermen are estimated to be killing more than a million dolphins a year in this area. Its once healthy dolphin population is now " dangerously low " . Dolphins, porpoises and whales are also being killed by toxic fluorescent chemicals that drug-runners use to show where cocaine packages are being dropped in the Pacific. Hundreds of the creatures have been washed up dead on beaches, poisoned by the marker substance that releases cyanide as it breaks down in the sea. Maria Elena Sanchez, of the Group of 100, a Mexican environmental organisation, said: " These animals don't have to die. There is a feeling of rage and helplessness that this is happening. " Colombian boats and planes frequently drop large quantities of cocaine packages into the ocean. They are picked up by Mexican drug gangs posing as tuna fishermen who then take the haul to US ports or return to their own country to smuggle it across the border. An official from the US Drugs Enforcement Agency said: " We are aware of this problem and we are doing everything we can to stop cocaine being brought into the United States. " Mr White said that the US government could be more effective in tackling the problem by curbing the trade in tuna caught using methods destructive to dolphins. He added: " It's clear that Washington knows what's going on, but as long as they keep turning a blind eye, then a million dolphins a year are going to continue to be killed to help line the pockets of drug barons. " =============== http://www.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/americas/04/01/costa.rica.dolphins.ap/index.ht ml SAN JOSE, Costa Rica (AP) -- Tourists and residents living near a beach on Costa Rica's Pacific coast saved 33 dolphins trapped on the sand. Swimmers found 37 dolphins Sunday on Cedro beach, 200 miles (330 kms) northeast of San Jose, the capital. With the help of area residents, they were able to return 33 of them to the sea. Four others died before they could be saved. It wasn't clear how the dolphins became stranded. Lara Anderson, administrator of the Cabo Blanco Nature Reserve near where the dolphins were found, said the creatures may have become disoriented by the highest tide of the year or may have been driven up on shore by several killer whales spotted in the area. ==================== http://starbulletin.com/2002/04/01/news/story2.html Monday, April 1, 2002 Whale bumps into boat of tourists The incident, in which the boat's stern was lifted, is the second to happen this season By Gary T. Kubota gkubota MAALAEA, Maui >> Tourists on a whale-watching cruise were startled when a humpback whale came up under the 65-foot catamaran and lifted the right stern several inches. National Marine Fisheries official Margaret Dupree said the March 15 incident is the second report of a whale bumping a boat this season, and her agency is reviewing both encounters. The double-deck catamaran Ocean Spirit was carrying 96 passengers on a whale-watching tour off South Maui and was in a stationary position waiting for a pod of approaching whales, including a female whale, her calf and four male escorts, said Anne Rillero, spokeswoman for the Pacific Whale Foundation, operator of the Ocean Spirit. Passengers watched the whales swim in the vicinity of the vessel for about an hour, and then one of the male humpback whales came up from beneath the vessel and hit the boat, she said. There was a loud boom, and the right stern of the boat was lifted four to six inches. The Ocean Spirit backed away from the male, then eventually turned around to move forward and away from the pod, as the whale followed the vessel for a few hundred yards. None of the passengers was injured, and the whale did not seem to be hurt by the encounter, Rillero said. " I think the people were excited. The whales were really involved with each other. We don't think it's a case of a whale ramming the boat, " she said. " This was the case of a whale pushing and shoving ... trying to get close to the mother (female) ... and bumping the boat. " She said typically, when the males are vying for attention, there is some lively interaction. Whale researcher Deborah Glockner-Ferrari said if the report is correct, there might be a variety of reasons to explain the whale's behavior in following behind the boat. She said the whale might have broken off from the pod and been traveling in the same direction as the Ocean Spirit or might have been curious and wanted to follow the vessel. She said it is also possible the whale might have been pursuing the boat. She recalled a Maui boat captain informing other boaters several years ago that a whale was charging his vessel. Glockner-Ferrari said when her boat arrived in the area, she saw a pair of whales heading in her direction. She said one of them broke off and swam away, but the other went straight for the boat and dived under it. " It did the same thing to several other vessels, " said Glockner-Ferrari, co-founder of the Center for Whale Studies. " We don't know if he was having a bad day. " She said her crew has had " close encounters " this season, with whales swimming nearer than usual. Glockner-Ferrari said she has noticed more juvenile whales in Maui County waters this year, and they tend to be " more playful and curious " than adults. " Generally, adults are more in control or pay attention, " she said. She said she had an encounter in 1979 with a calf that dived below her rubber boat, picking up a pontoon accidentally. Whale researcher Dan Salden said he has heard of male escort whales brushing boats but never lifting a vessel as it did the Ocean Spirit. " I thought it was significant, " said Salden, founder and president of the Hawaii Whale Research Foundation. Salden recalled two instances in which a whale bumped his boat, one five years ago involving a young adult that pushed off his boat. The other incident occurred in the late 1980s or early 1990s when a female whale bumped his boat with her pectoral fin, causing him to nearly fall off the vessel. " She was very interested in the boat, " he said. Whale researchers say most vessel bumps appear to be accidental and involve calves or juvenile whales that do not have as good control in swimming as adults. Researchers say a vessel being bumped by a whale is relatively rare, especially in Maui County waters, where federal law requires sightseeing boats to keep a distance of 100 yards when traveling in the ocean. Boat captains usually steer their vessels well ahead of the whale's route, then put their boats in a stationary position, hoping the whales will pass them. The maneuver gives the whales the choice of swimming toward or away from the vessels. Whale research vessels are exempt from the 100-yard standoff distance. Whale researchers say in calving waters off Baja California, gray whales are known to rub and bump vessels. In one account a gray whale lifted a small wooden boat and carried it on its back for a short time. Another account described a gray whale pushing her head under a boat and twirling it in circles. ==================== http://www.asahi.com/english/national/K2002040200361.html WWF gives OK to some whaling The Asahi Shimbun The World Wide Fund for Nature Japan gave a surprising, if qualified, blessing for resumption of commercial whaling Monday. WWF Japan officials said the organization would not reject resumption if conditions are met for numerous whale species not considered endangered and the operations are adequately supervised. However, they said protection for endangered whales is currently inadequate. Commercial whaling has been under a moratorium for 20 years since an International Whaling Commission decision in 1982. WWF has been a leader in anti-whaling campaigns since the 1970s. The new position by the Japan branch has the approval of the international headquarters, WWF International, based in Switzerland, officials said. The decision comes in the run-up to the International Whaling Commission's annual meeting, to be held in Shimonoseki, Yamaguchi Prefecture, during April and May. In recent years, the IWC has been very much a venue for whaling and anti-whaling countries and organizations to vent political and emotional frustrations. WWF Japan officials indicated they hope to end this polarization with the new policy. WWF International officials said they are working to gain acceptance of the policy departure from their other branches worldwide. But officials admitted this may be a tough sell in countries with strong anti-whaling sentiment like the United States, England and Australia.(IHT/Asahi: April 2,2002) ================== http://www.canada.com/halifax/news/story.asp?id={27DE9693-BF7A-4F39-93F4-4D8 85E8DAB47} Right whales produce 17 calves this year By PETER McLAUGHLIN The Daily News Tuesday, April 02, 2002 CANADIAN PRESS The herd of 300 endangered right whales appears to be rebounding. The endangered North Atlantic right whale had its best back-to-back birthing seasons in more than a decade, with 17 calves born this winter. Last year, the rare whales, which summer in the Bay of Fundy, gave birth to a record 31 calves. " It's been a good year, " said Chris Slay, a whale researcher with the New England Aquarium in Boston. " But in a population so highly endangered, any year is a good year. " Researchers, who had hoped for at least a dozen babies, are buoyed by the relatively large number of births this season. The herd of 300 is rebounding after three poor years when barely a handful of mothers gave birth. In 2000, only one calf was born. The year before, five were delivered during the calving season of January to early March. Scientists, who only began collecting data on the whales in the early 1980s, have recorded eight to 10 young whales born each year on average. Deborah Tobin, co-ordinator of East Coast Eco-Systems in Freeport, Digby Co., said two strong calving seasons is immensely encouraging for the herd, the world's last population of North Atlantic right whales. " It's definitely the best two years in probably all the time people have been studying right whales, " she said. The bigger struggle will be trying to decrease the number of deaths, she said. Although protected from whaling since 1935, the right whale today is under threat from collisions with ships and entanglements in fishing gear. Slay, who monitored the calving this past winter off the Florida-Georgia coast, said he's hopeful of a third strong year on the calving grounds next winter. " There's no reason to believe that next year won't be as good as this year, " he said. " It appears the animals are finding enough food and they're healthy. " Slay said the herd has a significant number of females that can bear calves. But the fortunes of the whale could turn within the next two years as scientists predict another major disruption in weather patterns. " That's when it becomes a question mark, because meteorologists are predicting another El Nino winter, " said Slay. " The last time we had a major climatological event like that, it did change plankton production and had an effect on the reproductive and general health of the right whale population. " ==================== Whale population begins exodus from Mexican coastal waters Story Filed: Saturday, March 30, 2002 2:25 PM EST Mexico City, Mar 30, 2002 (EFE via COMTEX) -- Some 6,000 whales that arrive annually on the coastline and lagoons of the Baja California Peninsula for mating, are beginning to make their exodus to northern waters. Whales, which travel a round-trip distance of more than 20,000 kilometers (12,000 miles) to reproduce and develop, seem to prefer Mexico's Pacific Coast, particularly along the Baja California Peninsula. Two species of whales migrate to the Mexican coasts, the gray and the humpback, and spread along the coastline of Baja California Sur, Nayarit and Jalisco for mating. The whales arrive in December, and although currently a few stragglers remain, they will join their traveling companions before the end of April, Environmental Protection Office representative Victor Martinez tells EFE. Although statistics on this season's birth rate are not available, the gray whale population is estimated to grow at an annual rate of 4 percent, Martinez says. Only the deaths of one calf and two adults were officially recorded this season, although no definitive figures are available, Martinez notes. The gray whale, generally a gregarious and playful species, is born in Mexican waters and travels 8 kilometers (4.9 miles) per hour toward the north, where it matures in colder waters and then returns to more temperate climes to reproduce. Efforts to protect whales from extinction due to unrestrained whaling largely have been successful, and the population has recovered, Environmental Secretariat biologist Mauro Ivan Reyna tells EFE. Large groups of gray whales travel to Mexican and Hawaiian waters, while the younger species stay behind along the Canadian and U.S. coasts, according to the biologist. The whales swim to the lagoons of Ojo de Liebre, Guerrero Negro, San Ignacio, Manuela and Bahia Magdalena along Baja California, and then return to Alaskan waters. The Mexican government declared the Laguna de San Ignacio a whale refuge in 1954 and in 1988 the area was expanded with adjacent lagoons and islands to create the Vizcaino Biosphere Reserves, where whale calves are born and grow. Additionally, groups of humpback whales arrive along the coastline of Nayarit and Jalisco, particularly in the Revillagigedo and Bahia Banderas archipelagos to reproduce, Reyna added. The number of tourists who travel to see the whales has increased in both areas, Reyna explained. Last year, some 140,000 people traveled to view and spent more than $1.7 million in Mexico. By Julian Rodriguez jrm/lm/rm By Julian Rodriguez http://www.efe.es Copyright © 2002. Agencia EFE S.A. ==================== http://onenews.nzoom.com/news_detail/0,1227,90972-1-7,00.html Whale study finds big blue The first comprehensive aerial survey of whale activity in the Hauraki Gulf is nearing completion. Scientists have spotted 21 species of whale and dolphin, including the world's biggest, the blue whale. A conservationdepartment scientist, Alan Baker, says the survey is also exposing the movements of the large bryde's whale. He says it has found the whale is present all year round and even breeds in the Hauraki Gulf. Baker says it was previously thought the bryde's whale migrated to warmer waters during the winter. He says the finding is important because of possible future whale watching interest in the species. The survey has been running for 2 years and has 6 months to go. ================= 01/04/2002 03:01 PM China's ocean pollution worsens A report by China's State Oceanic Administration, the SOA, says that heavily polluted ocean areas have increased by more than 4,000 square kilometres - mainly in waters close to major cities and industrialised areas, in particular parts of the East China Sea and the Yellow Sea. The report says that almost 175,000 square kilometres of seas around China are no longer suitable for marine life. ============= _______________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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