What with the effective collapse of their economy, you might be forgiven for thinking that people in Iceland have more pressing things to worry about than whaling, and undoubtedly you'd be right. Yet, in the midst of economic and political turmoil, whaling has been thrust back up the agenda by the outgoing fisheries minister's parting shot - granting a commercial whaling quota for up to 100 minke and 150 endangered fin whales per year, supposedly for export to Japan.
He did so knowing that he wouldn't be around to have to deal with the aftermath. It's scandalous that the Icelandic government are even considering exporting whale meat. Lest we forget, fin whales are still listed as endangered, meaning that trade in products from the species would generally be illegal. Unfortunately, such is the weakness of international agreements on conservation that a simple ‘objection' or ‘reservation' to the listing seems to let Japan and Iceland off the legal hook.
His decision seems to be a result of intense pressure from the small whaling lobby within Iceland. Since the new year, they've been running a marketing campaign with newspaper adverts saying 'Let's Go Whaling'. The arguments they are using include that securing exports to Japan will create jobs, and that Japan has a near-limitless appetite for whale meat.
Fortunately, that's not the case at all. Japan is saturated with 'local' whale meat that it can't shift, despite public money being spent on whale meat promotion campaigns. Even the leading whale meat restaurant, owned by the organisation which runs Japan's whaling programme, is closing down due to falling demand. Furthermore, Japan seems to have no plans to stop its own tax-payer funded whaling programme any time soon. It's difficult to believe that they would import meat from anywhere else at the expense of their ‘own' fleet - particularly not with a very limited market for the stuff, and during a recession!
The misfounded optimism of Icelandic whalers is based on an export of fin whale meat to Japan last year, but it seems pretty clear that this was little more than a propaganda exercise by the Japanese government. They're keen to try and demonstrate a demand for whale meat, to justify their own commercial whaling operations, and to justify spending taxpayers' money on funding a global campaign to overturn international opinion on whaling.
The jobs argument is also completely bogus - at best exporting whale meat would create only a handful of jobs for Iceland, and it is likely that it would cause many more tourism jobs to be lost. Whaling in Iceland is in direct competition with the tourist industry, specifically whale-watching, which is one of the fastest growing tourism sectors. Iceland prides itself as a global whale-watching destination, and a massive 115,000 people went whale watching in Iceland last year - equivalent to a third of the country's population! An equivalent amount of people have also signed up to Greenpeace's Iceland Whales Pledge, saying they will only consider Iceland as a holiday destination if they hang up the harpoons for good.
Tourists are essential to Iceland's economy, and as such the country's ‘brand' is very important. Continued commercial whaling has an adverse affect on the international image of this pristine holiday destination. It's a simple statement, but one worth repeating - whales are worth more to Iceland alive than they are dead. You can watch a whale many times over, but kill it only once. Whale-watching today is worth much, much more to Iceland than the commercial whaling industry could ever be.
The good news is that the new, interim government is reviewing the whaling policy, although they have to do so amidst a melee of conflicting priorities. Greenpeace's international executive director wrote this letter to the incoming government, and they are being heavily lobbied in the ‘whaling area' of Iceland not to overturn the decision. All eyes are now on Iceland's new government to do the right thing - to choose whale watching over whaling.
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