Shame on Iceland. They have resumed whaling.

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From News story today here

REYKJAVIK (Reuters) - Icelandic whale hunters slipped out from port in the early hours of Sunday to pursue their first catch of the large sea mammals in 14 years, after stormy winds prevented them from sailing on Saturday.

"We are out," said Gunnar Johannsson, captain of the "Sigurbjorg," one of the three vessels commissioned by the Icelandic Marine Research Institute to catch minke whales.

"We are planning to begin whaling but I won't tell you anything else," he said.

Many environmentalist groups and governments have criticized Iceland's decision to resume whaling. An international moratorium on the activity has been in place since 1986.

Three whaling boats have been authorized to catch a total of 38 minke whales for what Iceland describes as scientific purposes -- primarily the impact on fish stocks.

According to Johannsson, the first of the three vessels left port at about 8:35 p.m. EDT. There was no report of the other two ships' movements.

Iceland says it must control whales to protect fish stocks and protect the livelihood of the country's fishermen. An estimated 43,000 minke whales are believed to live in its waters, eating two million tonnes of fish and krill every year.

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Shame on the Icelandic Government.

Shame on its government ministers. Their incestuous relationship with Japanese Whale Meat traders will ensure that their names live on in infamy.

Shame on the workers in the so called 'research organisations' that have sponsored this mass murder of endangered species. If they have put their name to this disgrace then they are no longer scientists, they are commercial abbatoir workers, or worse, they are Judas to the Enviroment that they are pretending to protect.

There are lies coming from the Icelandic Government Whalers about the number of whales they want to kill and their reasons for doing it. For the greater good of the Icelandic people they say, to preserve fish stocks they say, to restore the eco-balance they say. Rubbish.

Iceland report part1

(And much juicier)
http://files.hsus.org/web-files/PDF/Iceland_report_pt2.pdf

There are lies coming from the environmentalists too, but some of what they say hits home. The last time Icelandic Government insisted on kill whales for research, an influential member of the Conservative Independance party owned the private research company with the exclusive rights to kill and sell the whales. The business made millions, helped no doubt by the rest of the world's decision to stop hunting the creatures that it had driven to the brink of extinction through greed.

That fact that greed is behind this restarting of whaling after a fourteen-year observance of the worldwide ban is clear because of the Icelandic Government's insistance that it be allowed to trade the carcasses in a commercial manner with Japan.

It is not the greed of the Icelandic people. They make far more from the 60,000 whale watching tourists than they do from their fishing industry. There are about 43,000 whales. For every whale killed the island does not lose just one tourist, it loses a hundred right-thinking people who have no wish to witness blood in the water.

Icelandic Tourism

It is the greed of the individual government ministers, that will profit in the short term from the sale of the whales exotic meat and oils, that is driving this gold rush.

It will be short term, not just because of the lack of tourists and the boycott of Icelandic produce, but because of real 'Reseach' done by the Norwegians on the whales of the North Atlantic. They found that the fat of whale blubber sucks up the (increasingly high levels of) heavy metals and PCBs in the ocean. Anyone who eats whale meat is poisoning themselves. This is bad for natives of the region who hunt whales for essential protien in an enviromentally insignifigant fashion, and its bad for the whales. Affluent Japanese people are going to find out that whale is as good for them as they are for the whales.

Here is my point. To do whale research, it may be necessary to kill five whales, not five hundred. The Icelandic fish stocks are depleted because of the impact of unregulated human overfishing , not whales. If overfishing was the true reason, A whale cull would be pointless. And more to the point, a Research loophole should not be used as a cover for a whale cull, which is in turn a cover for the harvesting of exotic meat and oils for resale.

Does anyone here agree with this Icelandic Government policy?

Is anyone here a member of Greenpeace?

Would you warn the Japanese about the poisonous PCBs ? (and the brown acid while you are in this frame of mind. After all, the guy beside you is your brother, man)

Would you look forward to an 'accident' whereby the whaling ships were scuttled, as has already happened to two ships of the Icelandic whaling fleet?

Answers on a piece of paper tied to a rock and hurled in the direction of Iceland's Head Prospector.

 

NNNNOOOOOOOOOOO!!! They can't!

Many species of whale are endangered, and I for one REALLY REALLY don't want anymore species to go extinct. There are a hand full of animals no one will ever see again, and I don't want whales to be one of them. Don't people get it? Even if you are careful and kill only a select few, it still damages the already-low populations! Other things humans have been doing have been decreasing their population also, why add whaling to the list?
Why are they whaling anyways? Whale oil is no longer needed for lamps, there is plenty other bountiful creatures to eat, and cosmetic companies seem to be doing fine without whale blubber. What is the need?
Another, purely my opinion, reason they shouldn't is that whales are so beautiful and graceful. I can't stand the thought of killing such a magnificent creature.

I don't care if I sound like a hippy, or a naive little child, or a tree-hugger. I don't like the idea of killing whales when I can't really see a need.

 

Why are people so sentimental about whales?

The species [minke] they will hunt is by no means under any sort of threat of extinction.

The international community is so blinded by emotional rubbish when it comes to whaling that people do not accept that this will not do any harm to the whale population [the numbers sanctioned is pretty limited after all], and it will help the North Atlantic fishing industry, something that both Iceland and Norway are pretty dependent on. Iceland as one of their {if not the} primary industries, Norway in order to sustain habitation along parts of the coast where otherwise there is very little prospect of employment. Of course the whaling provides employment in itself too.

Sure, I believe in controlling whaling, but a complete ban is detrimental to much of the North Atlantic community, something that the urban European and American population don't give two hoots about. They just want to cuddle a whale. Why I really do not understand.

I'd be happier if they said they were hunting for food, which of course is what will happen to the meat, but they just can't admit to it as things stand at the moment.

Rubbish. The largest industry in Iceland is the fishing industry. They now make more from tourism than they made from whaling in the mid 80's, but that is not to say that the two are incompatible unless more propaganda and threats are spewed out by environmental activists.

I agree in principle to controlled whaling in the North Atlantic where the populations are sustainable.

 

Viking has a point I think. Some countries never hounted whales or in an neglectable amount. Nor have they to care too much about their fishing-industry. Yet, international consensus seems to be, it's bad. It's easy to say it's bad, when you don't do yourself it in the first place.

If in other environmental aspects a comparable consensus would exist.

 

The limited number of whales to be sold is seen as the thin end of the wedge. The Icelandic government wanted to include even more whales in this first sanction, including endangered species.

Viking, you contradict yourself in the exact same fashion as the Icelandic government contradicts itself.

Either you have a limited cull, which will not help the fishing industry(which only has itself to blame due to short sighted mismanagement/decimation of Iceland's dwindling fish stocks).

OR

You have a wholesale slaughter, a free-for-all where no man of Iceland can say 'Stop. Enough', because everyone that is complicit in the sale of the abundant whales killed today loses his right to prevent his nieghbour from killing and selling the endangered remainder that is left five years from now.

It is the same story with Rain Forest devastion. Europeans have cut down all their vast forests over the last thousand years and replaced them with farmland. When the people of the Amazon are told that they are cutting out the lungs of the world they simply say, 'Europe won't put aside its land for forests, why should we?'

Whether you think that a country that is unable to farm 'its' fish resources will be able to show self-restraint and be able to sustainably farm 'its' whale population is beside the point. This is all just smoke to hide what is actually going on.


You have indicated that the money Iceland gains from whaling may be equivalent to what it loses in tourism, but there is a big difference. The money from tourism is spread around the ordinary people of Iceland. The money from whaling will go straight into the pockets of the Icelandic ruling elite and their Japanese paymasters.

You are right about the sentimentality. Why should anyone get sentimental about a few eskimos that won't/can't stand up for themselves without the rest of the worlds support?

It is not sentimentality that stopped the world from whaling. It is common sense. If the whalers of the 1800s and 1900s had not decimated whale stocks, if whales were now as common as cows, then they would be valuable because they were a food resource for everybody and not simply a delicacy for a few rich people.

If Iceland had a whale population problem it should have openly asked the for International backing for a one off cull. Iceland should have made sure that its motives were above suspicion by disposing of the bodies of the whales in the ocean without removing anything more than scientific samples from the carcasses.

It should have been handled in the exact same way that elephants are culled and their ivory is destroyed.


You don't put more food in the sea by stopping the food that is already there from reaching viable population levels. You may think that 40,000 is viable, but what if they get a disease like the one that wiped out thousands of Atlantic seals?

You put food in the sea by reducing (or stopping altogether) the overfishing that is preventing the fish population from recovering to its natural level. Fishing boats use high-tech sonar to practically empty the seas these days. They scoop up huge numbers of fish that cannot be sold, and which die on deck before being dumped back in the sea. Fishing quotas are no better. They encourage fishermen to only land the fish species that their quota covers, and wastefully dump perfectly good (albiet dead) speciemens of other species.

It is man that has to be taken out of the equation, not the whales, as has been done by the decommisioning of the majority of the British fishing fleet. If the Icelandic government can't afford to do that, then the world should demand to know why.

What right does the world have to take Iceland to task over its failures?

Fish and whales live in the oceans and the oceans belong to no single country. Some whales swim a quarter the way across the globe twice a year. How can Iceland simply claim the right to kill them when they enter their waters, while the rest of the world protects them for the rest of the year? Why does Iceland think that its assault on one part of the oceans eco system won't have an effect on all other ajoining areas of the ocean?

The world has every right to tell Iceland that it does not have the right to screw the oceans up for the rest of the world. It has no more right to do so than Britain has to pollute the Atlantic with radioactive effluent from the Selafield Nuclear Power Station. It has no more right than France has to detonate nuclear bombs in the Pacific.

Every nation has dirty hands, one way or another, and they cannot tell each other what to do, so it is up to every individual to cry foul when they see another individual acting against the interests of the future of humans on this planet. Pressure must be brought to bear on Iceland so that its people remove the short sighted, greedy individuals that lead them.

I, as an individual am going to boycott their produce, as soon as I find out what the hell they actually make, does anybody know?

hands hurt...must not stop.. must say....

Shame on Iceland

[ August 18, 2003, 12:47: Message edited by: Gollem ]

 

As I said, controlled whaling would be the key to resumption.

I agree that the fish stock population is a major problem for all nations involved in the fishing industry. It's just that most are not quite as dependent on it as Iceland. And no, Iceland are by no means the only ones to blame.

There is not necessarily a contradiction. This is NOT a cull, and managing the resources around Iceland does not mean having either fish or whales, it means having both. And commercially fishing/hunting both.

OR

Sure there are only two options, right? We kill it all either all the fish or all the whales or perhaps neither of those two.

And it employs people in Icland on the hunting ships, in the whaling stations, in the processing plants, etc, etc. Oh yeah, and the coins roll in for the "Ruling Elite"

Also if controlled, there is no reason why the two can not be compatible.

*BUT* Icelanders *are* standing up for themselves *without* the worlds support. That's what *YOU* object to. About 3/4's of the Icelandic population are in favour of the resumption of commercial whaling.

The Icelandic people are not eskimos/ Eskimos live in Greenland and Canada and are a totally different race.

That shouldn't be too difficult for you to guess? They are an island in the North Atlantic, and natural resources other than the ocean are scarce. You cannot sensibly import raw materials for production of export goods since it is too costly to be competitive. What should we do? Tell the Icelanders that they can't hunt whales, can't fish, but have to sustain a 300,000 strong population on whale-wathcing tourists?

Not everyone around the world depend on the sea to the same degree that Iceland does. No-one is saying that we should not learn from the mistakes of the past, but I think perhaps a more realistic approach should be taken by the world community regarding this.

Exactly, QED.

Your comments about ruling elites and rich people's delicacies, are emotive drivel. Last time I had whale meat it was OK though rather salty, and price wise on a par with good steak, which makes it overpriced in my book. At that price I would much rather eat raindeer, though I'm sure you'd object to that too?

 

Maybe because of the misuse we as humans have done on the earths natural resources some extreme measures like no whale fishing or no wood cutting do not look so extreme anymore. Viking is right from a point of view and Gollem is right from another point of view. But i tend towards Gollems point of view because i feel that it would not hurt anyone not to have some whale meat or oil or whatever product can be produced from a whale. And especially after the whole misuse and overfishing issue. But as i said from the begining this is only my humble opinion

 

I would just like to point a few small things out before you jump blindly in without facts.

1) I'm a HUGE environmentalist. I recycle everything, I'm in the environmental club, I volunteer a lot of time at the Worcester EcoTarium (it's a museum/learning center that's completely devoted to the environment, my main job was saving the Painted turtles species which was endangered in MA but now is almost back to full population thanks to our efforts) I wanted to be a vetrinarian specialized in zoology when I grew up and I take as many as environment courses as I can. (On that note, buy hybrid cars -- they rock) So when I continue with this please do not in any way assume I don't care about animals. I care so much about animals, people (my Dad included) think I'm crazy. And I also want to get a photo-journalist job with National Geographic someday writing articles on endangered species and how they can be protected.

2. **HOWEVER** The Minke whale is the most populous baleen whale with an estimated 800,000 world-wide. To hunt a mere 32 of them won't in ANY way damage their species or the fragile web of ecosystem. If they were going to kill 3200, I would agree that seems overly much for a science experiment and would agree that it would appear that they were going back into whaling and would probably destroy the species. They're not though. 32 is not a lot when there are 800,000. If Siberia killed 32 Siberian tigers -- THEN would be the time for uproar because there are only 200 left in the world. But 32 Minke whales isn't a problem. In fact, you might even see a population boom of Minke whales in one area because of this.

The ecosystem is a very fragile web and its effects are not always visible. But I can tell you that killing 32 Mike whales, provided that that is ALL that are killed a) isn't starting up the whaling industry again for the purpose of whale products and b) isn't detrimental to the Minke whales. I understand your fervor on this subject but PLEASE do get all the facts on subjects first. Even if it is a reporter's job, they don't always and so they can portray things in the wrong light. So I beg everyone who's mad at Iceland: chill out on this subject, there are far more important environmental issues at hand than Iceland killing 32 whales. If you really want to get mad at something, get mad at George Bush -- he wants to drill the Alaskan Reserves for oil and refuses to help sponsor alternative energy sources. OR get mad at the companies that dump their chemicals into the ocean -- they are killing far more sea creatures (whales included) than Iceland ever will.

 

Our society is at a pont now where the vast majority of us do not hunt for a living. As a result, there is a knee jerk reaction against any form of animal harvesting. We get our food at the supermarket, and we are affluent enough as a society for people to get all their nutritional needs without any meat (I'm referring to vegetarians and vegans). So we look down on hunting and such as barbaric. Well, not every society is like ours. There is nothing wrong with controlled hunting. Like Silverwolf86 says, 32 out of 800,000 is nothing to get wound up about if you are a logical person. Iceland has probably done the studies and decided that their whaling activities will not destroy a species. They'd be fools not to have done so, because if they wipe out a whale species, their infrastructure based on whaling will collapse! I think there are MUCH more pressing environmental and social issues than this one.

 

I agree. I too am a bit of a bleeding heart, especially when it comes to animals. And I too am horrified at the rate at which our oceans have been overfished and emptied over the last 50 years by human fishing industries. But it's exaggerated, unfounded and borderline fanatical arguements like this that give environmentalists a bad name. Bravo Silverwolfe, for putting logic before emotion.

Another big industry in Iceland is tourism. One of the biggest, in fact. Why? What's to see in Iceland? Whales, that's what. They'd be stupid to cannibalize one industry for another, especially when they're a nation with so few profitable industries.

If they negatively effect the whale population in any way, no amount of successful fishing enterprise will offset the disaster that would result from the loss of tourism. It's taken enough of a hit as it is since the news of the whaling resumption broke. The last thing they want to be seen as are whale killers, and I'm sure that if these whales didn't devour millions of fish a year they would perish the thought. Last I checked, Minke whales consume more fish per year/per whale than just about any other species of whale. Thinning the herd a bit does make economic and ecologic sense.

I think Iceland is going about this the right way. Time will tell if they abuse it, but for now it looks like the right way to go.

 

Why is Iceland reverting to hunter/gatherer techniques of generating income instead of creating a technology based industry to take the pressure off their dependance on fishing?

We will all just have to wait and see if they do take more than 500 whales per year. It adds a new meaning to whale watching.

 

I'm pleased to see I'm not the only one who feels this is hysteria.

Bluin, changing the emphasis of any economy cannot be done overnight. It get's a lot harder when you're as far out of the way as Iceland is.

To give you an idea of the importance of the fishing industry, it accounts for something like 60-70 % of Icelands total exports. In otherwords it is the life blood of their economy. You cannot just replace that overnight with technology based industry. Those industries are growing, but it will take a long time before Iceland is not dependent on the sea, if that can ever happen.