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SCIENCE & NATURE
Push to harpoon ban on whaling
Matthew Denholm
January 21, 2005
COMMERCIAL whaling banned for almost 20 years could be given the go-ahead to resume as early as June.
Conservation groups and government delegates to the International Whaling Commission told The Australian yesterday they feared Japan and other pro-whaling countries now had the numbers on the commission.
Nicola Beynon, a member of Australia's delegation to the IWC, said she felt the June meeting in South Korea would vote to resume commercial whaling. "We are gravely concerned at the last meeting there were three or four votes in it, now it's a knife-edge," she said.
The Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society said it feared commercial whaling was on the verge of an unwelcome comeback.
"Unfortunately, the countries that have joined the IWC recently are more likely to vote for commercial whaling support for ending the moratorium is growing by the day," said Philippa Brakes, a New Zealand-based scientist with the society.
Six new nations have joined the IWC since June last year Kiribati, Mali, Surinam, Tuvalu, Belgium and Ivory Coast. Conservationists believe only Belgium would vote against lifting the moratorium on commercial whaling imposed by the IWC in 1986.
Japan has been accused of using the leverage of fisheries aid money to persuade South Pacific countries to join the IWC and back its pro-whaling stance. This approach has resulted in the number of IWC members growing from 37 in the 1980s to the 59 members to be represented at the meeting in Ulsan, South Korea, on June 20-24.
Adding to the concerns of anti-whaling countries, several fence-sitting nations such as Sweden, Ireland and The Netherlands are thought to be ready to vote in favour of lifting the moratorium under a compromise deal.
"It would require a vote of two-thirds of members to lift the moratorium, but the problem for those of us who want to keep the ban on commercial whaling is that a number of countries who sit in the middle want to compromise," said Ms Beynon.
"And those votes would be enough to get a two-thirds majority. In our view, those countries are naive."
The pro-whaling countries, led by Japan and Norway, are pushing a compromise deal under which commercial whaling would resume under a revised management scheme, which would impose conditions and a process for calculating quotas.
But conservationists say the conditions are hopelessly slack and the quota process is based on overly generous estimates of whale numbers.
Ms Beynon, a spokeswoman on whales for the Humane Society International, said pro-whaling countries wanted to expand so-called scientific whaling, under which 440 Minke whales are killed each year. "We expect them to seek to increase those numbers and to extend it to other species as a way of adding to the pressure for a compromise," she said. "They are upping the ante."
Push to harpoon ban on whaling
Matthew Denholm
January 21, 2005
COMMERCIAL whaling banned for almost 20 years could be given the go-ahead to resume as early as June.
Conservation groups and government delegates to the International Whaling Commission told The Australian yesterday they feared Japan and other pro-whaling countries now had the numbers on the commission.
Nicola Beynon, a member of Australia's delegation to the IWC, said she felt the June meeting in South Korea would vote to resume commercial whaling. "We are gravely concerned at the last meeting there were three or four votes in it, now it's a knife-edge," she said.
The Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society said it feared commercial whaling was on the verge of an unwelcome comeback.
"Unfortunately, the countries that have joined the IWC recently are more likely to vote for commercial whaling support for ending the moratorium is growing by the day," said Philippa Brakes, a New Zealand-based scientist with the society.
Six new nations have joined the IWC since June last year Kiribati, Mali, Surinam, Tuvalu, Belgium and Ivory Coast. Conservationists believe only Belgium would vote against lifting the moratorium on commercial whaling imposed by the IWC in 1986.
Japan has been accused of using the leverage of fisheries aid money to persuade South Pacific countries to join the IWC and back its pro-whaling stance. This approach has resulted in the number of IWC members growing from 37 in the 1980s to the 59 members to be represented at the meeting in Ulsan, South Korea, on June 20-24.
Adding to the concerns of anti-whaling countries, several fence-sitting nations such as Sweden, Ireland and The Netherlands are thought to be ready to vote in favour of lifting the moratorium under a compromise deal.
"It would require a vote of two-thirds of members to lift the moratorium, but the problem for those of us who want to keep the ban on commercial whaling is that a number of countries who sit in the middle want to compromise," said Ms Beynon.
"And those votes would be enough to get a two-thirds majority. In our view, those countries are naive."
The pro-whaling countries, led by Japan and Norway, are pushing a compromise deal under which commercial whaling would resume under a revised management scheme, which would impose conditions and a process for calculating quotas.
But conservationists say the conditions are hopelessly slack and the quota process is based on overly generous estimates of whale numbers.
Ms Beynon, a spokeswoman on whales for the Humane Society International, said pro-whaling countries wanted to expand so-called scientific whaling, under which 440 Minke whales are killed each year. "We expect them to seek to increase those numbers and to extend it to other species as a way of adding to the pressure for a compromise," she said. "They are upping the ante."
