ENVIRONMENT-JAPAN: After Whales, the Hunt Turns to Porpoises

By Suvendrini Kakuchi Reprint | | Print |

Suvendrini Kakuchi

TOKYO, May 20 1999 (IPS) - Conservationists are accusing the Japanese government of ignoring the rampant hunting of porpoise around the country’s northern coasts, a practice that they say will lead to the extinction of some types of marine mammals.

An average of 18,000 porpoises are harpooned each year off the coasts of Hokkaido, Japan’s northern island, according to Allan Thornton, chairman of the London and Washington D.C.-based Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA).

This estimate, he said last week, is based on investigations carried out by conservationists in the eighties and in this decade.

Particularly worrisome to many is the continued demand for and supply of porpoises, now that it has become harder to hunt whales on a commercial basis.

The EIA report, released to coincide with the May 19th meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) convention, says 250,000 porpoises have been killed since 1986 when the IWC ban on commercial whaling was implemented.

Thornton says two populations of Dall’s porpoises are exploited in Japan’s harpoon hunt.

Especially worrying are the recent catches of lactating females with young calves in the Sea of Japan, an indication of severe overhunting.

Likewise, a population that breeds in the central Okhotsk Sea is hunted in its winter range off the Pacific coast of northern Japan from November to April.

The Dall-type porpoises, found throughout northern Pacific and adjacent seas, are hunted in the Sea of Japan from May to mid- June, the period of breeding.

In fact, conservationists believe that the increase in porpoise hunting after the whaling ban is the result of huge expansion in the trading of Dall’s porpoise meat.

Traditionally, such porpoise meat was used for local consumption in northern Japan, where harsh winters limited food supply.

But, the EIA report explains, porpoise meat is being shipped southward to compensate for decreased availability of striped dolphin and whale meat.

The report and a video shown to the press showed several factories here that were processing porpoise meat into cans that carry the label “whale meat”.

Thornton himself points out that as early as 1989, the IWC Scientific Committee noted that “there is evidence that porpoise meat being substituted for whale meat in commerce because of the decrease in access to large whales”.

He also said that the IWC passed a resolution in 1990 calling on Japan to reduce its annual catch of porpoises to 10,000 animals, a request blatantly ignored by the government. The official catch in 1997 was 18,540 Dall’s porpoises.

There are more than 70 kinds of cetaceans or marine mammals, such as whale, porpoise and dolphin species, and international regulations spell out different fishing categories for them.

Except for scientific whaling, there is an outright ban on hunting IWC-prohibited species of whales.

Twenty species such as spotted dolphin and the short-fin whale, are covered by fishing quotas. Eight other kinds such as small whales and sharks are covered by a prohibition on hunting, and the rest follow a sustainable hunting table.

According to a government scientific survey conducted six years ago, the population of Dall’s porpoises stood at 550,000, with reproduction rates at 3 percent, an estimate that has not changed following subsequent annual surveys.

A government official says that Japan follows a policy of “sustainable hunting”, adding that the current population numbers do not point to the extinction of the species.

More than 200 boats, each with a crew or two or three people, are licensed to hunt Dall’s porpoises. But the EIA investigation team said it saw many unlicensed boats, and also documented large whaling companies involved in the porpoise meat trade.

Shigeru Komori of World Wild Life Fund, Japan says that while activists must be vigilant, the situation is not that extreme.

He adds that scientific research conducted by the Japan government forms the current hunting policy of porpoises. “With the evidence of the current estimates of Dall’s population, we see no immediate extinction of the species,” he says.

Still, Komori explains that WWF has called on the Japanese government to conduct stricter management and monitoring of Dall’s porpoise populations, as a result of reports about overhunting made by western conservation groups.

Komori adds that it is important for reports touching on the dangers to the Dall’s porpoise populations to also consider environmental factors such as the warming of the sea, which also contributes to the decrease in populations.

“The only way to protect these animals is to urge better monitoring and management methods in order to collect clear scientific data on population numbers,” he explains.

On this point, at least, there is agreement among different conservation groups.

The EIA is also appealing to the Japanese government to reduce the allowed catch of Dall’s porpoises to pre-1986 levels.

It also seeks comprehensive population surveys in both summer and winter distributions, and the establishment of a national monitoring and inspection scheme to ensure strict compliance with catch quotas and hunting regulations.