What would happen IF?

Since the IWC meeting in Sorrento this past July, a number of observers of the whaling dispute process have wondered just what will happen next. Japan has been very patient, and very steadfast in the belief that if enough countries are recruited to understand Japan's position, and to support it, that the day will come when the IWC Plenary shall vote to lift the moratorium on commercial whaling. However, if that day does not come within the next meeting, then what?

In 2005 it will have been 23 years since the moratorium was voted into effect. No real progress has been made, and we note that the vote numbers regarding whaling still show that the member States are strongly polarized on the issue. If the Revised Management Scheme is not adopted in the 2005 meeting, Japan has stated that it "has a very important decision to make". Other nations have stated that even if the RMS is agreed upon and adopted, that this does not mean an automatic levying of quotas for minke or any other species. The opponents intend to stonewall this issue indefinitely. There is no diplomatic environment here, no civilized spirit of compromise and respect for either science or for cultural traditions.

Japan's arguments that commercial whaling for minke should resume immediately are based in a number of facts: minke whales are extremely abundant, and the RMP formula for quotas of the various stocks are very conservative. Those fulfilled quotas would not affect minke stocks one way or the other. Japan has a several thousand year history of harvest of minke and other whales (also abundant today) for food. The cultural expectation of coastal peoples in Japan is that their government will prevail in this matter, and will win for them the right and the international recognition that their ancient whaling traditions shall again be honored and fulfilled.

Japan's scientific research has clearly indicated that minke, sei, Brydes and sperm whales around Japan are abundant to the point that they are a significant factor in the local marine ecosystem. If the IWC does not very soon concede that Japan is justified in the yearly proposals that resumption of commercial whaling should immediately begin, the Japanese people expect that their government may finally leave this irrational organization, and give its citizens permission to conduct whaling in a regulated manner once again. At that point, the IWC Parties would no longer have any control over this major whaling nation. The organization will have failed in its mission to cooperate with all nations in whale conservation.

Where would that leave the IWC? Perhaps the body would concentrate on regulation of whale watching. Norway conducts regulated commercial minke whaling, and has suffered no significant adverse political or economic consequences. Iceland conducts very limited scientific research whaling, and no actual political or economic harm has resulted. Iceland may watch this process with Japan play out, and decide to follow suit. Her people need to manage their whales as well as their fish stocks, and they recognize that minkes in the North Atlantic have a significant ecological impact.

Japan's deputy commissioner stated in the Sorrento meeting, "We will never give up!" Some media present have quoted Komatsu in this instance, and report that the world believes Japan is going to resume commercial whaling very soon, regardless. It may be through finally garnering enough votes to achieve the needed ¾ majority to amend the Schedule, to accept the RMS and to even set quotas for minke. Or, it may be that Japan shall strike out on its own, to satisfy its people and correct the perceived ecosystem imbalances that Japanese scientists have been recording in the last few years.

One way or the other, the Japanese whalers will go to sea again and will bring the products back home to market in their coastal towns. And because Japan wisely took a reservation on the Antarctic whale sanctuary some years ago, her large ships will again ply the Southern ocean, not only to complete and continue scientific research projects in those waters, but to finally bring home the minke product for commercial sale in the amounts that scientists have recommended - and again, those quotas fulfilled shall not adversely affect minke whale stocks in any region of the Antarctic.

IWMC strongly supports Japan in these attempts to finally win the ¾ majority necessary in the IWC, and we support Japan in proposals at CITES, that minke whales should be placed on Appendix II where they belong, according to biological criteria. We believe that Japan is morally justified in stating that the nation will never give up on its quest to conduct scientifically justified, culturally important commercial whaling in the very near future.