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posted by martyb on Friday December 28 2018, @08:37PM   Printer-friendly
from the something-to-blubber-about dept.

Submitted via IRC for takyon

Japan restarting commercial whaling, ignoring global moratorium

On Wednesday, Japan announced that it was pulling out of the International Whaling Commission (IWC), a step that will allow it to restart commercial whaling in the spring. The move comes after a failed attempt to get the IWC to set legal quotas for legal hunting by its members. For whales, the news is good and bad: the move with shift Japan's hunting to its territorial waters, and away from the healthier populations in the Antarctic.

[...] Whaling ruling helps to clarify what counts as science researchAfter a hiatus, Japan restarted its whaling program, and began pressuring the IWC to set quotas for commercial whaling, something that was supported by Iceland and Norway, and was specified as a goal in the IWC's charter. But most other countries, noting that some populations of whales were only just beginning to rebound—there are under 500 right whales left in the North Atlantic, for example—rejected this proposal. Japan, suspecting that the IWC might never set quotas, has decided to withdraw from the organization instead.

Japan's announcement means that it will be free to restart commercial whaling in July. As part of the change, the country will no longer be sending ships to the Antarctic, a move Australian leaders say means these waters "will finally be true sanctuaries for all whales.” (The Australian government has otherwise condemned the move.) Instead, the whaling fleet will focus on Japanese territorial waters and economic zones. The country also says it will set limits on its hunts based on IWC estimates of populations. Currently, however, there's no indication of how Japan will track the number of kills and whether they'll report them to the IWC.

Others' takes:
BBC: Japan 'to leave whaling commission to resume hunting'
NatGeo: Japan will resume commercial whaling. Get the facts.


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 29 2018, @07:44PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 29 2018, @07:44PM (#779788)

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