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April 15, 2008Nisshin Maru Arrives in Tokyo after failed "research" in the Southern Ocean
© Greenpeace/Naomi Toyoda
Japan's factory whaling ship, the Nisshin Maru was "welcomed" into Tokyo earlier today, by Junichi and our team from Greenpeace Japan, along with the word "failed" to accompany the ubiquitous and Orwellian "RESEARCH" painted on its hull.
During its five months at sea, the Nisshin Maruwas responsible for taking 551 minke whales from the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary - far less than the 1035 whales planned, but more than a hundred than were killed three years ago. Our ship, the Esperanza, shutdown Japan's entire whaling operation for 15 days, during a 4300-mile chase of the Nisshin Maru across the Southern Ocean. The whalers are blaming the protestors (that'd be us then) for missing their target.
The whalers had also planned to hunt 50 endangered fin whales, and 50 vulnerable humpbacks; but they'd barely reached the Southern Ocean when international outrage forced Japan's government to back down on the iconic humpbacks. And as for the endangered fin whales - none were killed at all, which is extremely good news. Before the hunt, Japan's Institute for Cetacean Research (the agency that runs the "scientific" whaling programme) were mouthing off about a 'rapid increase' in fin whales (no whales reproduce "rapidly"... they're not like rabbits). Yesterday, however, fisheries agency officials reported that it wasn't possible to kill any fin whales - because they couldn't find any! So much for the rapid increase - just another sign of their failed research programme.
Hans Monker
You would never pick out Hans in a bar as a hero. He just didn't have the look. But he went places most people wouldn't dare go, to do work beyond most of us - for Greenpeace, Médecins Sans Frontières and other groups.
He was born in the Netherlands, traveled most of the world (from the Amazon to Antarctica) and died in Vietnam - where he lived with his wife.
Recently, Hans checked into the hospital with pneumonia. He responded well to treatment, and checked out several days later - eager to get back to work on a Greenpeace project. Today, he collapsed and passed away at a hotel breakfast table.
Hans was a behind the scenes person. Not one for the spotlight. He had strong convictions though, and when pressed would talk about them. Here's his crew profile from our first ship tour together - a voyage to defend whales in the Southern Ocean:
It is important for me to participate in this campaign - for a long time millions of people all over the world have been united in voicing that whaling is just not on - we have a responsibility to make sure that we preserve whales, not kill them.One of mankind's greatest gifts is the one of creation - we have the ability to create both beautiful as well as destructive things.
Another gift given to mankind is freedom. We are capable of choosing to destroy or protect the earth.
Creativity and freedom are not for free - we also have the responsibility to use our gifts in a good way, that is: to make things beautiful, then we can enjoy them together, in freedom.
My personal goal to be with Greenpeace is to be part of a group of people that gives others food for thought.
-- Hans
I was lucky to know Hans, but I know a lot of you knew him better than I did. Please leave messages in the comments. We'll pass them on to his family.
Save the planet -- eat a whale?????
It's hard to know whether to pity or admire an opponent when they're up against a wall and start throwing out the desperation arguments.
In 2006, when the Competitive Enterprise Institute was finding it increasingly hard to buy climate science that challenged global warming, they dumped a lot of Exxon dollars into an excruciatingly bad TV ad with the belly-laugh tag line: "CO2: they call it pollution, we call it life."
(That may be why they got dropped from the sponsorship of what our Man on the Exxon Funding Watch, Kert Davies, calls the "Denial-a-palooza" Conference currently underway in the US)
But our old Viking Whaler pals at the High North Alliance have just thrown the best kitchen sink argument in a long time: "Whale Meat -- it's a climate-friendly alternative to beef."
Now this, kids, is desperation. Iceland couldn't sell enough whale meat last year to justify sending a single whaling ship out this year. Norway doesn't even bother to kill as many whales as their quota allows because they can't move the stuff. Even in Japan, demand continues its decline despite government-funded marketing pushes and subsidised price-cuts.
You can see why they need a new sales pitch.
But let's just accept that the High North Alliance's long-documented concern for the environment and alarm at global warming are genuine, and that they're not just looking for a way to push old wine in a new bottle, and run the numbers:
World production of beef in 2005 was about 50 million tons.
Let's assume we want to make a 1% decrease in beef consumption. And even though it is not true, we will assume that whale meat production has zero CO2 cost. So to replace 1% of the world's beef production we need 0.5 million tons of whale meat - ie 500,000 tons. The Norwegians get about 1.5 tons of meat from a minke whale, so to generate 500,000 tons they will need to kill about 330,000 minke whales.
Unfortunately this is more than double the population estimate - they would wipe out the minke in under 6 months.
Whoops.
And so, once again our friends the folks who drove species after species of whale to the brink of extinction demonstrate precisely how far you can trust the whaling industry to regulate themselves -- which is about as far as you can throw a kitchen sink.
Shukan Toyo Keizai on whaling
Here's an extremely interesting special report on whaling, from a Japanese business magazine. The translation is a bit patchy, but it's a fascinating glimpse -- and confirmation that, unlike the picture you get if you read the propoganda at the Institute for Cetacean Research website, there is in fact a domestic debate about whaling in Japan, and a growing tension between the Foreign Affairs department, which is constantly having to patch up relations with allies over a distraction, and the Fisheries Agency, which keeps a few bureaucrats fat and happy by shrilly pushing Japan's whaling programme down the throats of all opposition -- whether its us oceanic hippies or their own government colleagues.
If you don't make it to the end, here's the most important part:
" Some connected with whaling say that huge enterprises that are far outside the framework of realistic choices could be interested. Being one of the few issues on which Japan has made a stand against the United States and European countries, the stance of whaling hardliners could also be a vent for narrow-minded nationalism. In the end, that could easily be detrimental to national interests. Perhaps the Japanese people need to take this opportunity to reexamine the whaling issue for themselves."
Whalers stuck in the red
A recent article in the Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun has reported that the financial status of the Japanese whaling industry is looking pretty bleak right now. The Institute of Cetacean Research (ICR), which is responsible for "research" whaling, has failed to pay back 1 billion yen ($9.4 million US) out of a 3.6 billion yen national loan in 2006. The ICR borrowed the money from the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries and was supposed to pay it back at the end of the fiscal year but reported financial difficulties and requested to pay the interest-free loan back over 4 years instead.
The cost of whaling has been rising because the ICR has increased their quota despite the fact that the value of whale meat continues to drop due to decreasing demand. In 2006 he whale meat supply increasing by 30% and the price being cut by an average of 20%, there was a 6% decrease in the sale of whale meat (in 2006) compared to the previous year. Meanwhile, the cost of whaling rose by 10% because the number of vessels in the fleet increased from 5 to 6 and the hunting season was extended.
The Japanese public must be wondering how long their government will continue to throw public money at this failing attempt to revive commercial whaling. Surely it is clear that the only way out of this mess is to stop sending a fleet of ships to the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary!
It's frustrating that in spite of heavy international opposition to whaling in these waters, the Government of Japan continues their annual hunt. But we're glad that scandals like this are being exposed in the mainstream Japanese news and the folks at Greenpeace Japan are hopeful that continuing domestic pressure will force the Government to retire the whaling fleet.
Help us increase the pressure in Japan to end whaling in the Southern Ocean Write to Mr. Mitarai, the CEO of Canon and head of the Japanese Business Federation and ask him to defend the whales.
Canon Can Save Whales
In less than 24 hours, since we launched the "Canon Can Save Whales" Appeal, over 15,000 people have sent letters to the CEO of Canon Japan asking him to speak out against whaling. While the sheer number of letters is encouraging, what's even better is the time that some folks are taking to write personally to Canon.
Here's a tiny sample:
"My family and I love canon cameras- they are all we've ever owned, and we will love them even more if you prove to the world that Canon is committed to building a better world for future generations, and does not support the hunting of endangered or threatened species with anything other than a camera.The earth would be incredibly less beautiful without whales."
--
"I recently purchased a new Canon Rebel XTi DSLR camera and will return it since I have learned of your unwillingness to denounce the irresponsible killing of whales with harpoons. I may not be able to control your obvious immoral stance on this subject, but I can control what products my friends and I purchase and from whom. I am very disappointed with Canon!"--
"As a happy and dedicated owner of two Canon cameras I was disappointed to see the less than stellar position you have taken with regards to the whale hunt. While I agree, in general, that there are many positions to take on a subject, in the current case it is obvious to all but the most willfully blind that the whale hunt is an economic and political concession to a small and out of touch minority from an era best left to the history books. I would have hoped that as a respected member of the business community you would have been happy to state as much.Over the last number of years I have encouraged many friends and members of my firm to purchase Canon cameras; however, given your recent position I certainly will not be buying anymore of your products and most definitely will not be recommending them either."
--
Japanese people encouraged to re-examine whaling
A Special Report has appeared in the Japanese buisiness magazine Shukan Toyo Keizai and we thought we'd share some of the translated version here. The folks at Greenpeace Japan have been very pleased that there is a discussion going on in the Japanese media lately since it's been such a long time coming.
"In the past few years, Japan has rapidly expanded its research whaling and has been trying to win support with numbers at international meetings. (...) Tensions in the Antarctic Ocean over Japan’s research whaling have reached an unprecedented high."
The article boldly sates:
"For companies, whale-related businesses are an “operational risk”. "(...)
and goes on to conclude:
"Being one of the few issues on which Japan has made a stand against the United States and European countries, the stance of whaling hardliners could also be a vent for narrow-minded nationalism. In the end, that could easily be detrimental to national interests. Perhaps the Japanese people need to take this opportunity to re-examine the whaling issue for themselves."
Blue Monday - let's give it a new meaning!
Today is known as "Blue Monday" in the UK because it is apparently the most depressing day of the year. It's likely to be raining (and as I look at the window of the Greenpeace International office in Amsterdam - it is!) and more people commit suicide today in the UK than any other day of the year! Yesterday there were calls for the day to be banned as it only encourages depressing thoughts but I have an idea! Why don't we take this opportunity to give Blue Monday a new meaning altogether? What else does the colour blue make you think of without feeling sad? What could we use "Blue Monday" to celebrate? My suggestion would be to make today about celebrating whales and the oceans that they live in. I've been meaning to post this amazing footage of humpback whales on here for sometime now and what better day is there to seize for this? After watching this video there is absolutely no way you could still be feeling depressed!
It's made by Andrew Stevenson who is a friend of mine in Bermuda. He has spent hundreds of hours in the water with these majestic creatures and is now passionate about raising awareness about the plight of all whales, especially the ones being killed in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary.
Thankfully, at least humpback whales are safe from Japanese harpoons for now...
Greenpeace webcam: you, too, can spot the Nisshin Maru
Late last night, the word went out that we had found the fleet. On board the Espy, the Bridge bristled with binoculars as the crew sought to catch a glimpse through the fog and snow. And judging from the webstats, an awful lot of us Virtual Crewmembers and Cyber Salty Dogs went barrelling toward our own version of the bridge -- the live Esperanza Webcam, where a tiny smudge on the horizon said that once again, against all odds, we had found the Japanese whaling fleet in the vast expanse of the Southern Ocean.
For me, sitting warm and dry in my home in Amsterdam, I was able to experience some of the vicarious excitement of the hunt. I loaded up the webcam page. There. Up on the horizon off the starboard bow. There was our quarry, the Nisshin Maru.
Konichiwa, boys.
Virtual Whale Watching
Last night at 1 o'clock in the morning I was just about to go to sleep in Amsterdam when Karli, the expedition leader on the Esperanza, messaged me saying "check out the web cam now, we have 30 or more humpbacks all around us eating their breakfast". Sure enough, after a few minutes of waiting patiently gazing at my laptop I saw a humpback surface in front of the ship with a spout! Like many whale watchers, I've been lucky enough to see humpbacks up close but how many people can say they have watched them in the Southern Ocean, in real time, from their bed in a completely different hemisphere?
You can view live web cam images here and check out some of the images captured from last night here. Irene, the lovely web editor on board the Esperanza has also written about "sailing through whale breakfast" on the blog and she is setting up more web cams around the ship now so us land lubbers should have an even better virtual whale watching experience soon!
Aye, very like a whale...
Mister Splashy Pants' characteristic dorsal fin is clearly visible in this snap of visitor statistics to this weblog.
Get yer Mister Splashy Pants gear here: http://www.cafepress.com/greenpeace
And if you haven't voted for your favourite whale name yet, the contest ends tomorrow: Vote!
Then make sure that whatever name you choose, you take action to make sure that humpback doesn't get harpooned.
Mister Splashy Pants Fan
Thanks to our friends over at BoingBoing and Reddit, Mr Splashy Pants is in the lead for the Greenpeace name-a-whale competition. What isn't so well known is the identity of the unsung hero that made it all possible. We don't know all the details but from what we have managed to piece together, it appears that someone found a way around our 'one vote per person' rule and began a clicking frenzy that was to change the face of the competition.
Dear Ms. Yamaguchi, about your whale curry...
A Japanese company said Tuesday it would start offering whale curry in its takeaway business lunches, as the country pursues its controversial whale hunt in the Antarctic.Asian Lunch, which says it sells 1,000-1,500 lunch boxes daily in Tokyo's business districts, will offer the meat once a week, starting Thursday with a South Asian-style keema curry.
[...]
As for protests against Japan's whaling, [Asian Lunch spokeswoman] Yamaguchi said the company just "does not want to waste meat once their lives were deprived of for research."
"We would feel uncomfortable if we hunted whales by ourselves for the purpose of eating them," she said.
Dear Ms. Yamaguchi,
You should feel uncomfortable selling whale curry. The whales that you are eating were "deprived of their lives" not for the purpose of research: there are non-lethal means of learning virtually everything which research with a harpoon can tell us. And while it would make you uncomfortable if the whales were killed for the purposes of eating them, this isn't the case either: 4,000 tonnes of whale meat sit unsold in cold storage while the Japanese Fisheries Agency attempts to launch desperate programmes to get rid of it through school lunchs and other subsidized programmes.
The reason you should feel uncomfortable, Mr. Yamaguchi, is that the whales that were killed to make your curry were killed to line the pockets of a very few bureaucrats who spend 945,550,000 yen per year, about US$ 8.6 million, subsidizing a whaling programme that generates no useful science and a lot of unsellable whalemeat.
Rather than feel uncomfortable, you should cancel your contract and demand an explanation of the Japanese Fisheries Agency and the parliamentarians who approve these scandalous subsidies every year.
There is no honour in eating a lunch made possible by a criminal waste of taxpayer's money.
Rumours from Tokyo: Humpbacks to be spared the harpoon?
Greenpeace and the Japanese Fisheries Agency have been locked in conflict over whaling for a long time, and sometimes the game of figuring out your opponent's moves can look an awful lot like the old Mad Magazine comic, Spy vs. Spy.
We know from server logs that the whalers read every word here at Making Waves and at our main website. (Which means I'm taking a bit of mischevious joy in the thought that somewhere in Japan right now, some researcher is trying to get a hold of a Mad Magazine to figure out what Spy vs. Spy is...)
But the whalers know, too, that we have a few sources who tell us inside stories from time to time.
Here's an interesting one: a rumour from a well-placed source that the Japanese Fisheries Agency has decided to quietly abandon plans to hunt 50 threatened humpbacks as part of their psuedo-research whaling efforts this year.
Now at this stage all we have is an unconfirmed rumour. And we don't know whether this was a decision taken over fears that selling the whalemeat from the "scientific" hunt might be a violation of the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species, or if there were concerns about public outrage over the killing of the sea's most charismatic of whales, or -- who knows -- they've been convinced by the case we're making for non-lethal research via the Great Whale Trail.
But since Japanese Prime Minister Fukuda is meeting with George Bush today, maybe we could ask George to drop into that friendly, charming drawl and ask "Fukuda-san, is it true what I hear about you not harpooning them humpies?"
Iceland to stop whaling!
Result! One country down, two to go. Norway and Japan are the only two countries left flying in the face of world opinion, after Iceland's fisheries minister, Einar K. Guofinnsson was quoted by Reuters as saying
"The whaling industry, like any other industry, has to obey the market. If there is no profitability there is no foundation for resuming with the killing of whales".
Guofinnsson said he won't issue a new quota until the "market conditions for whale meat improve" and permission to export whale products to Japan is secured. Presumably, the 5,000 tonnes of whalemeat currently sitting in Japan's coldrooms will need to get sold first.
I had a sense this might happen - while I was at the International Whaling Commission (IWC) meeting in Anchorage this year, the newly elected Icelandic foreign minister, Ingibjorg Solrun Gisladottir, practically disowned her country's pro-whaling commissioner, saying "we are sacrificing greater interests for lesser ones in this issue". She was referring, of course, to Iceland losing tourism revenue for the sake of a ridiculous whale hunt.
Japanese animation: Our turn to save the whales
Academy-award nominated Japanese animator Koji Yamamura has created this tiny, beautiful story about a Japanese headmaster who saves a whale, returning a debt for having been saved from starvation after the second world war. The 2-minute film took him 5 months to make and comprises 1700 drawings.
You can read more about Yamamura here.
Food for thought on whaling and Japan
This morning Keiko (press officer for Greenpeace Japan) sent me an article from the Asahi Shimbun (a major Japanese newspaper). It makes me wish I understood Japanese culture better. If this was in a UK or US newspaper I'd suspect the writer was being cleverly sarcastic, but I'm not sure they really do sarcasm in the Japan. Here's the start of the English version:
When Japan bowed out of commercial whaling operations 20 years ago, it opted to conduct "scientific whaling" instead.The controversial strategy seemed to offer an opportunity to learn more about whales at a time of worldwide concern about declining stocks of these gracious mammals.
So what has Japan learned?
Well, it has caught and slaughtered more than 10,000 whales in pursuit of mostly sketchy and hotly disputed data about whale populations. But that seems a meager result for two decades of research.
Meantime, whale meat has ended up in the marketplace just as before. This has coincided with moves in some parts of Japan to reintroduce children to the joys of whale meat in their school lunches.
At any rate, it is good to see the issue being more seriously addressed in Japanese media. In the year's past it's been mostly ignored or portrayed from a strictly nationalistic point of view. I can think of lots of reasons this has happened, but think the whale love wagon did its small part to open up the debate.
Migrating Human Whale
One thousand schoolchildren send an SOS for whale protection and launch the Migrating Human Whale Project from the shores of Loreto Bay National Marine Park in Baja, Mexico.
This is the first of eight Human Whale aerial images involving nearly ten thousand schoolchildren from Mexico to Alaska leading up to the International Whaling Commission
meeting in Anchorage on May 28.
If you want to add to the chorus of whale defenders worldwide, join the Big Blue March May 27th. Wear something blue!
17 whale deaths every 30 minutes
While politicians and bureaucrats talk, activists in Germany presented evidence of environmental crime at the Brandenburg Gate.
They set out 17 dead whales and dolphins, which were collected in the last weeks along European coasts. Why 17? It's the number of dolphins and whales that die every 30 minutes all year round in our oceans, mainly due to bycatch.
This grisly fact underscores the need for four things:
-New thinking in fishery policy in order to minimize bycatch
-A network of protected areas for our oceans
-The International Whaling Commission meeting next week in Alaska needs to deal with all threats to all species of whales and dolphins. In some cases, even governments which support whale conservation at the IWC turn a blind eye to whale deaths being caused by their own policies.
--Maintenance of the moratorium on commercial whaling to counter the wider environmental pressure on these animals and our seas.
Want to make a statement with people all over the world? Wear a blue t-shirt and join the Big Blue March this Sunday, May 27th!!!
Party for the Whales
Last year I decided to raise money for the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society (WDCS) by having a party with my friends and getting them to give me money for all kinds of things. I put on a showing of the movie "Deep Blue" by the makers of the Blue Planet series, provided food and drinks, offered tarot card readings and games with prizes and in return my friends gave me their hard earned cash. I ended up raising over $200 and for an evening filled with fun and friends I felt it was an incredibly easy way to raise money for saving whales.
I'm going to do it again this year and have just sent off for my free Save The Whale Week party pack. If you're interested in partying for whales, check out the WDCS "Save The Whale Week" website for more details.
Iceland weighing whaling
The decision to formally resume commercial whaling is being seriously re-thought in Iceland - as can be seen from an interview with its Prime Minister Geir Haarde. From Reuters:
Haarde, facing elections on May 12, said the government must factor global criticism into its decision-making."It's an equation with several elements in there -- one is the market, one is world public opinion, one is tourism and so on -- and we have to weigh all these together, and the different interests, before we come up with a new decision," Haarde said.
The global outcry is obviously having an effect. Add your voice by signing the Iceland Pledge (to consider visiting if they end ALL Iceland whaling).
Esperanza "banned" from Japan
Apparently under some pressure, our agent there has decided she can't represent us. And without an agent it is all but impossible for us to take the ship into port. So we're not being officially blocked by the government, but are being kept out none the less.
Background - Our ship, the Esperanza, was more than 500 miles from the whaling fleet when a fire broke out on board their factory ship. But we responded at full speed to their location and rendered what aid we could. After 10 days without engines, they managed to get underway again.
Life-sized Blue Whale banner
Want a glimpse of just how big a Blue Whale is? Check out this "life-sized" Blue Whale banner from The Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society.
This is an extremely cool concept: it's really, really hard to visualize how big these creatures are.
In a lifetime of whale watching, I have seen one blue, off the coast of Iceland. I called my son that night, who was five at the time, to tell him I'd seen an animal bigger than a dinosaur.
"Wowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww."
"His tongue is as big as a car"
"Wowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.
He wanted to know when he could go to Iceland. The answer, of course, is "Just as soon as Iceland stops whaling."
And that brings us to today's news about Icelandic whaling: Back in 2003 when we brought the Rainbow Warrior over to Iceland to talk with people about the issue, 90% of the public supported Iceland's "scientific" whaling program. Earlier this week, a Gallup survey asked the question "Are you satisfied or dissatisfied with the Minister s decision to start commercial whaling again?" the result was a 50-50 split. So the numbers are moving in the right direction, and our challenge now is to keep them moving the right way until the government does the right thing, and ends both commercial and scientific whaling in Iceland forever.
If you too, want to see a blue whale in the wild, and you want to protect the endangered finn and minke whales which Iceland hunts, join the Iceland Whales Pledge, which has ammassed millions of dollars in potential tourist income, against a whaling industry which currently loses money. All you do is promise to visit Iceland if the government stops whaling.
And believe me, you'd be hard pressed to find a more beautiful spot from which to watch the whales. In the spring on the North side of the island, the sun shines past midnight and you can sit in a hot spring high on a hill, and watch the humpbacks breaching in the bay below. Pledge today, and join us there for the very big party we're planning to throw when the whales of Iceland are saved forever.
Warhol and whales
So today is the 20th anniversary of the death of pop culture artist Andy Warhol. The celebrated artist died unexpectedly on this day in 1987 after undergoing a gall bladder operation. As a tribute to the artist and in keeping with our campaign in the Southern Ocean to end whaling for good, i present you with, '100 cans of whale'.
Endangered?
This week saw some news that under normal circumstances would be greeted with celebration and be seen as a showcase for the possibilities of conservation efforts. In the US, the wolf has been removed from the endangered species list in three states with another three states likely to follow. After three decades, conservation efforts have brought the iconic species back from the edge of extinction after being taken to the brink by hunting.
But in the same breath in which the news of the wolf's return was announced, it was also announced that the removal of the endangered species tag from the wolf's name means that they can now be legally hunted again. The very thing that placed the species on the endangered species list in the first place was to be allowed once more.
Whether the spokesperson for the US Fish and Wildlife Service, who announced the good news for hunters, understood the irony wasn't recorded. The imminent resumption of wolf hunting raises the question of whether conservation efforts around the world are there for the sake of the species and the ecosystems in which they live or simply for the sake of future exploitation.
UK whale conservation recruitment drive
Greenpeace UK oceans campaigner Willie Mackenzie responding to reports that the UK government is recruiting pro-conservation governments to the International Whaling Commission:
Last year UK NGO's asked Blair to write personally to key countries explaining that a resumption of commercial whaling was a very real threat. So far he has refused to do this, but today has announced that he will write the foreword for a brochure. While Greenpeace welcomes a brochure against whaling it is hardly a move which will have the same impact as a personalised letter or a direct meeting.The Japanese Government has been building a voting majority at the IWC for the last 10 years, with Prime Ministers and Foreign Ministers actively lobbying for a resumption of commercial whaling.
If the UK Government want to claim they are fighting a resumption of commercial whaling then they must urgently up their game, and Tony Blair must raise this issue within Cabinet and directly with other Heads of State.
Willie sounds fairly unimpressed. With the Japanese government running a very aggressive pro-whaling recruitment drive (often backed by development aid), the UK government will need to try a bit harder.
But why wait for our governments? Start your own campaign, or connect with others, at whales.greenpeace.org.
Bad press day for Icelandic whalers
Oh dear. It's being reported in the Icelandic newspaper Frettabladid that 179 tons worth of the 7 endangered fin whales that where caught last fall have been buried in a land fill.
The whaling industry is claiming this is "entrails and bones," but Gisli Vikingsson at the Icelandic Marine Institute notes that the average weight of the fin whales caught was about 50 tons, so that's more than half the entire animal being wasted.
But wait, it gets worse.
When asked about the 100 tons of unsold whale meat that sits in freezers in Iceland unsold, Kristjan Loftsson, manager of whaling firm Hvalur, (who rather refreshingly appears to have skipped the PR spin training that most whaling industry spokespersons get) said "the delay was because firms must first test the meat for dangerous chemicals to see if it meets food industry standards."
Well that's reassuring, isn't it?
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