ENVIRONMENT-JAPAN: Whales Spared, but Ugly Debates to Continue

By Suvendrini Kakuchi Reprint | | Print |

Suvendrini Kakuchi

TOKYO, May 24 2002 (IPS) - Japan had hoped that it would have a home-court advantage as host of this year’s meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC), and gain enough support to reverse a 16-year ban on commercial whaling.

Though defiant until the end, Tokyo conceded defeat in its battle to lift or at least ease the ban, but not without accusing its opponents of double-standards.

“The IWC is not a place for generating a fair discussion,” Masayuki Komatsu, a key negotiator from Japan’s Fisheries Agency, told reporters. “Japan has hoped for a balanced negotiation, which was certainly not the case,” he said at the end of the five-day IWC summit on Friday.

That the meeting — which brought together 45 pro and anti-whaling nations, plus a host of conservationists and representatives of the whaling industry — was held in Japan’s hometurf of Shimonoseki, also known as Whale City, was doubly crushing for Tokyo.

There were about 300 Japanese delegates, the biggest number ever, as it included leaders of local governments with links to whaling. The western Japanese city of Shimonoseki is an old whaling port and one of the few remaining cities that still engage in the rapidly dwindling trade.

As the Commission’s 54th annual summit got underway on Monday, accusations by international conservation groups of Japan’s vote-buying re-surfaced.

“As the Japanese government recruits more poor countries into the IWC in exchange for overseas development aid, the balance of power is shifting within the commission and it will become impossible for anti-whaling nations to maintain the moratorium much longer,” Greenpeace International warned in a statement on the eve of the meeting.

“Vote buying by the Japanese government is making a mockery of the democratic process at the IWC. The process should be decided by one country, one vote,” says Ocean’s campaigner Richard Page.

Japan wields 15 votes. The vote-buying strategy, however, failed to give Japan an upper hand in its campaign to lift the whaling ban.

The IWC slapped a moratorium on commercial whaling in 1986, but Japan and other countries such as Iceland and Norway, are arguing it is time for a reconsideration.

Japanese officials proposed plans to hunt in the waters off Japan up to to 150 minke whales, including 50 in coastal hunting, 50 Bryde’s whales, 10 sperm whales and 50 of the bigger sei whales.

In addition, Tokyo also sought to effectively nullify the 1994 Southern Ocean Sanctuary, but failed after being voted down 25-16. There were four abstentions.

The economic future of South Pacific countries, “lies in whale-watching rather than killing whales for the benefit of a small number of people”, said Australian Environment and Heritage Minister David Kemp.

Australia, along with the United States, Britain and other anti- whaling nations, voted down Japan’s proposal to ease the ban, saying whales still need protection.

But Japan, accusing its opponents of double-standards, flexed its muscle and blocked a joint bid made by the United States and Russia that would have allowed their indigenous people to continue taking bowhead whales for five more years.

A number of the participants said Japan sabotaged the outcome. In a statement, Japan’s Fisheries Agency attributed the failure to “the United States’ hypocritical stance”.

Since 1987, Japan, which says whale hunting is part of its tradition, has conducted an annual whale hunt in the Antarctic under ‘scientific’ and ‘research’ terms. Activists say, however, this is but a cover for commercial whaling, as the loophole had allowed Japan to hunt 600 whales last year.

A key argument put forward by Japanese officials for the resumption of whaling was based on feasibility studies in which Japan estimates a stock of 28,400 sei whales in the northwestern Pacific.

Sei whales, the second largest after sperm whales, are considered an endangered species. But the Fisheries Agency reports hunting of sei whales is necessary because its biomass – population multiplied by weight – is threatening fish populations.

“Given the magnitude of fish consumption by whales, we cannot ignore the impact of whales,” said an official of the Fisheries Agency, who asked not to be named.

This argument, however, did not seem to convince many at the IWC, an observation The Yomuiri, Japan’s largest newspaper, dwelled on in an editorial, which suggested that anti-whaling members command the IWC.

“If Japan takes the course of presenting its arguments with a mind solely to win the resumption of commercial whaling, it will not be able to win the understanding of other IWC member countries,” says the editorial on Tuesday.

On Friday, the newspaper blasted the IWC for failing to develop a cool-headed approach to the debate, which it describes as “ignoring all attempts by Japan to raise the key issue of a balance between food supply and conservation”.

The opinion reflects the general mood in Japan. “The whaling issue has turned into a Japan bashing game,” says Kanako Iida, 23, who has never eaten whale meat in her life. “I am really angry with the way Western countries are behaving.”

Kunio Yonezawa, a member of the Global Guardian Trust, a Japanese group promoting the sustainable use of marine life, says he is bitterly upset about the outcome of the meeting.

“We are sick of the unrelenting attitude of anti-whaling countries. There is no compromise on the issue,” says Yonezawa.

Conservation groups acknowledge the whaling issue in Japan has boiled down to national pride.

“It has become imperative to educate the Japanese about conservation of whales based on true facts. This is the best way to protect the whales,” explains Motoji Nagasawa, whale campaigner for Greenpeace Japan.

Greenpeace Japan placed several newspaper advertisements urging the public to understand the facts about whale preservation. A new web page it set up on the issue generated almost 2,000 opinions from readers, some of whom asked what was wrong with eating whale meat if sustainability can be ensured.

Support for a resumption of commercial whaling – 47 percent, according to a Asahi Newspaper survey in March – is based on the belief that the mammal is an important food source and a means of livelihood for whalers.

The older generations of Japanese eat whale meat and many of Japan’s traditional crafts, such as the strings in classical Bunraku, or puppetry, have been made from whale whiskers.

Masako Matsuo, who teaches environmental politics at Kyoto Seika University, hopes for a constructive debate on the issue. She calls on conservation groups to consider the whaling issue from a “realistic” viewpoint.