“IWC is Driving Itself to Extinction” |
| 25 May 1999 - St. George’s, Grenada, WI: The International Whaling
Commission’s (IWC) credibility and control over the regulation of whales
and whaling worldwide is in serious jeopardy. That is the consensus
of pro-whaling and anti-whaling organizations as both IWMC-World Conservation
Trust and the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) echoed similar concerns
at the IWC’s 51st Meeting in Grenada.
In its opening statement at the IWC conference, WWF stated it was “deeply concerned that the credibility of the IWC will be seriously jeopardized” due to the “number of whales hunted outside of IWC control continues to escalate every year.” “IWC is driving itself to extinction because it is becoming increasingly more irrelevant to the needs of whales and of whaling communities,” said Eugene Lapointe, president of IWMC-World Conservation Trust and former Secretary-General of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES). “IWC seems to forget that its mission is to conserve whales and regulate, not end, whaling.” Lapointe was among the speakers of a panel discussing the future of IWC. He was joined by Chief Tom Happynook, traditional whaling chief of the Huu ay aht tribe of the Nuu chah nulth First People Nation of Vancouver British Columbia; Stephen Boynton director of IWMC-WCT; Alan Macnow representing the Japan Whaling Association; and Othneal Olliverre, a 78 year old active harpooner from Bequia. They concluded that IWC would suffer a devastating loss of dues revenue – a quarter to a third of all IWC income – should the whaling nations withdraw. IWC would be powerless to halt the exodus or whaling by the departing nations as it has no enforcement powers. Exhorbitant fees for membership and for observers were questioned as a possible ploy to prohibit participation by small and developing nations. Lapointe stated that IWC is “not global” and that policy is set by a “mere 15 votes.” Representatives of Japan’s traditional coastal whaling communities expressed resentment at biased reporting on whaling worldwide. They said they have waited patiently for 12 years for IWC to acknowledge his people’s nutritional and cultural needs. IWC responded by refusing Japanese coastal whalers a quota of 50 from a worldwide population of over a million minke whales. That and passage of required killing techniques for subsistence whalers (termed “impossible” to fulfill by one Inuit whaler) increased talk of an IWC boycott by native whaling cultures.Ť For further information, please contact
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