The following are selected editorials taken from the most recent issues of the INWR Digest. Editorials from previous issues along with complete issues of the INWR Digest can be viewed here.
This month, the 58th Annual Meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) convenes in St. Kitts and Nevis. It was during the 42nd IWC meeting held in Noordwijk, the Netherlands, in 1990 that a decision was taken to establish the International Network for Whaling Research. It was decided the network would produce a newsletter, organize conferences and workshops on whaling topics, and seek to interest an academic press in publishing books on whaling. The first INWR conference was held in Winnipeg, Canada, on community-based whaling in the northern regions, followed by others in Washington DC, Lake Tahoe (Nevada), Quebec City, Halifax (Canada), Bodø (Norway), and Berkeley (California). The INWR newsletter (INWR Digest No. 1) began publication in October 1992, and continues to be mailed to individual subscribers and libraries; it is also accessible on the INWR website. In 1991, CCI Press in Edmonton, Canada, agreed to publish a dedicated series of books and monographs as its Studies in Whaling series (ISSN0838-133X). In this issue of INWR Digest, the latest book (No. 8) in this series is announced: Scientific Uncertainty and the Politics of Whaling by Michael Heazle of Griffith University, Australia. Dr. Heazle’s book focuses attention on the impasse within the IWC over the appropriateness (or not) of sustainably utilizing (i.e. conserving) whales, and how considerations other than those of a scientific nature affect many of the arguments and the decisions being taken in the IWC. This same theme was explored from a complementary (anthropological) perspective in the previous Studies in Whaling volume, titled Marine Mammals and Northern Cultures (by Arne Kalland et al., announced in INWR Digest 31).
The presence of mercury, a potent neurotoxin, in the marine environment and throughout the marine food chain, has resulted in recent concern being raised about the possible health impacts from eating whale products. Despite high levels of mercury in the tissues of arctic whales regularly eaten by residents in the circumpolar North, recent research offers evidence that these concerns may be unfounded. Research reported at a recent arctic science conference (Kinghorn et al. 2005, see PUBLICATIONS) found that mercury levels in the historic ancestors of present day Inuit in the Beaufort Sea region were estimated to be six times higher than found in contemporary Inuit residents in the region. The World Health Organization has earlier suggested that very high levels of selenium found in these same whales and in Inuit tissues, in some manner may detoxify dietary mercury, and other studies suggest omega-3 fatty acids also offer protection again mercury toxicity. Neuro-chemical detoxification mechanisms are currently being experimentally investigated (see Lye et al. 2005, in PUBLICATIONS).
The Digest continues to provide news on whaling research to researchers and libraries in many countries, and we appreciate hearing from researchers regarding the work they are doing in diverse study areas. We aim to publish information on whaling research carried out in the social sciences, history, archeology and law, and in other relevant fields (such as, e.g., the performing and graphic arts). A glance at this issue of the Digest indicates that research on whaling in diverse research fields continues, published and communicated at whaling symposia and workshops, and that whaling and whale cultures continue in various countries and provide opportunities today for those wanting to study in situ whaling. Readers are reminded that the INWR Website, www.ualberta.ca/~inwr/ contains further information on whaling and whaling research, and useful links to other whaling research websites
In 1990, a number of researchers attending an international conference on North Atlantic whaling societies being held in Aarhus, Denmark, endorsed the idea that a forum to facilitate on-going communication about whaling research would be useful. It was agreed that future whaling conferences (with published proceedings) should be organized, and a newsletter should be established to facilitate communication among whaling researchers. Although the Digest communicates the results of researchers work (i.e, in the Publications section of each issue), it has failed to communicate news of research-in-progress. In this issue of the Digest we are pleased to include information describing an on-going research project directed at the Inuit beluga hunt and sale of whale products taking place in a Canadian whaling community. We look forward to receiving contributions from other researchers willing to share their research and thereby enhance the timely research communication function of the Network.
This issue of INWR Digest is about to be posted as the 56th Annual Meeting of the IWC begins in Sorrento, Italy and the Northern Hemisphere whaling season is in progress in Canada, Faroe Islands, Greenland, Iceland, Japan, Norway, Russia and the United States. The IWC meeting program involves continuing discussion on such issues as the Revised Management Scheme (RMS), whale sanctuaries, killing methods and welfare issues, socio-economic implications of small-type whaling, the future of sustainable whaling, financing the commission’s work and secret ballots – all contentious issues in past years. Despite this however, the membership of the Commission steadily increases, at the same time as one recent commentator (Corkeron 2004, see PUBLICATIONS) observes "the dysfunction of the IWC as an international management organization has not lessened in the past decade". Corkeron comments that, while "ritual whaler-bashing at the IWC remains a convenient conservation fig leaf" for "nations with no whaling industry and less than exemplary environmental management", should not "whales-as-icons join flared pants and mirror (disco) balls as 1970s discards?" The answer for IWC members seems rooted in their disparate domestic political agendas, and so continues the refractory thirty-year IWC stalemate. Nevertheless, we wish the delegates well as they, hopefully, begin to seek the middle ground during their passionate discussions variously in support of, or in opposition to, the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling, the treaty which provides IWC its legal basis. Credible whaling research by natural and social scientists has, in the past, contributed to illuminating the issues and, in some cases, the solutions to difficult management issues. Hopefully a return to rational discourse and responsible action will not prove impossible at this pivotal time in the IWC’s history.
The current issue contains information on two recent European government initiatives concerned with whaling. On March 19 2004 the Norwegian government introduced a new policy document affecting whaling; some of the main points can be found in this issue of INWR Digest, with a link to the Norwegian full text and English summary of the policy document posted on the INWR website at www.ualberta.ca/~inwr/issues/index/
On March 10 2004, a German parliamentary committee held hearings on whaling and whale protection. This committee had invited a number of German and foreign individuals knowledgeable and/or involved with whales and whaling to respond to 65 questions. The questions were directed to, inter alia, the status of whale stocks and factors affecting the stocks, current protective measures, whale research and research whaling, whale utilization, the adequacy of the IWC Revised Management Procedure (RMP) as a regulatory measure, and if continuing disagreement over the RMP threatens the existence of the IWC. It is interesting to note that each of the experts (with the exception of the Greenpeace spokesperson) in responding to questions about the RMP, stated that sustainable whaling can be carried out under the RMP and that the anti-whaling bloc in the IWC poses a real threat to the continued existence of that body. The full responses by the six invited respondents (from Germany, Iceland and Norway) are posted on the INWR website (in the same section as the Norwegian White Paper referred to above).
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n this issue of INWR Digest we report on some recent attempts by researchers and anti-whaling organizations to support calls for ending whaling. These include the conclusion reached by Roman and Palumbi (see Publications section below) that the pre-commercial whaling- era whale populations in the North Atlantic were considerably greater than currently accepted. Currently accepted estimates of pre-whaling populations are derived from historic whaling logbook and market analysis. Scientists familiar with whaling logbook analyses remain sceptical that the huge population increases estimated from the recent study (based on theorizing about the current genetic variability of contemporary whale populations) are feasible or that the discrepancies in estimates obtained from these two approaches can be easily reconciled.Another challenging conclusion this year appeared in an article by A.M. Springer et al. suggests that commercial whaling was the cause of recent large-scale changes in the North Pacific marine ecosystem, including the collapse of various marine mammal populations. Springer et al. hypothesized that when killer whales lost their primary food source (posited as large baleen whales and sperm whales) to commercial whalers, killer whale in the 1960s began to progressively destroy the seal, sea lion and then otter populations. Support for this questionable contribution to understanding ecosystem dynamics and variability is scarcely enhanced among credible marine scientists when the lead author suggests "all whale species must be allowed to return to their former abundance, so they can properly play their role in ecosystems" www.nature.com/nsu/030922/030922-5.html
Which brings us to efforts this summer to impede Iceland’s research whaling program by a number of anti-whaling governments and some like-minded non-government organizations (NGOs). The letter of protest sent by these governments, together with a response from the Icelandic government, is posted on the INWR website www.ualberta.ca/~inwr/issues/iceland_announces_research_whaling_program.hmtl. The campaigns mounted by NGOs is also predictable, warning that Iceland’s tourist industry will suffer greatly if research whaling commences. However, as reported in this issue of INWR Digest, despit ewarnings by Greenpeace, the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) and others whale protection organizations that tourism will suffer if whaling is resumed, the numbers of visitors to Iceland significantly increased during the months when whaling occurred. What is noteworthy was the increased numbers of tourists during the whaling season from the UK and Germany, two countries expected to be among the most susceptible to appeals for a tourism boycott.
In this issue of INWR Digest we also report the best-year ever for tourism in north Norway -- where a decade of whaling and calls for tourism boycotts certainly has not negatively impacted tourism in general or whale-watching tourism in particular. In past editorials, we have suggested areas where whaling-related research might merit attention. Perhaps researchers might consider critically testing a new hypothesis, namely that whaling may have a positive impact on tourism -- for any number of counterintuitive reasons.
As this editorial is written, the IWC is holding its 55th annual meeting in Berlin. In the past, we would have waited until the meeting ended before distributing INWR Digest, in order to report decisions taken that might affect whaling. However, with easy access to the IWC website www.iwcoffice.org we decided that delay was unnecessary. We will, however, post various IWC items on the INWR website as soon as available. In this issue of the Digest, we report on the appearance of a new book (edited by William G.C. Burns and Alexander Gillespie), and an Australian academic dissertation (by Michael Heazle), both of which contain analysis and commentary on IWC performance in the past and today.
Readers wishing to see back issues of INWR Digest are referred to the INWR webpage <www.ualberta.ca/~inwr>. For the first time, the webpage will carry an item not included in the Digest. We refer to the item chronicling the on-going court challenges to the Makah Indian tribe’s efforts to exercise their legal right to hunt gray whales. A recent review of the history of court decisions and challenges, was too long to carry in full in the Digest; however a summary of the most recent legal reversal suffered by the Makah follows below, with additional information posted on the INWR webpage. The purpose of INWR is to provide the interested research community with information on current events and recent publications. You are warmly invited to send contributions to the editors for inclusion in the Digest or for posting on the webpage
Research on whaling-related issues continues to flourish, with conferences, publications, weapons improvements, sighting surveys and management-related research from the North Atlantic and North Pacific reported in this issue of INWR Digest. Researchers can anticipate an expanding scope for research as, e.g., the Norwegians continue to normalise their whaling activities by maintaining a stable minke whale fishery and resuming international trade in whale products.
We also report on two forthcoming international conferences at which researchers in diverse fields, whalers, and managers will share information on matters of common concern related to whaling. Other news of significance reported in this issue of INWR Digest, includes the creation of a new whalers' association in the Caribbean region. This new organization is established with the purpose of protecting and enhancing Bequia's whaling heritage. It is noteworthy that after years of unequal struggle in the IWC, the small Caribbean nation of St. Vincent and the Grenadines in 2002 obtained a doubling of the Bequian humpback whale quota, albeit only to four whales, but (in IWC terms) a significant increase nonetheless.
The publication section of the INWR Digest is the feature that brings us welcome feedback, but we are aware of our inability to locate and publicize the many publications appearing each year in an expanding array of journals, dissertations, reports and in other forms. If you, the reader, can supply us with information on your own (or others') publications, we will be most grateful to be able to share them with the researchers and libraries who access this modest publication variously in hardcopy (sent mainly to libraries), directly by e-mail, or on the web (our website is currently being improved).
In this issue of INWR Digest we report on the refusal of IWC to allow Iceland to rejoin the commission. The closeness of the vote determining this result reflects the continuing polarization and impasse existing at IWC, a problem earlier reported on in this newsletter (see "IUCN expresses concern about IWC" INWR Digest 19; "IWC woes continue" and "IWC receives more warnings" INWR Digest 20; "Editorial" INWR Digest 21). Looking ahead, it will be interesting to hear or read the report given by the IWC Chairman at the November 2002 CITES meeting, as he tries to reassure CITES members, once again, that IWC is making progress in its management of commercial whaling. But how will the IWC Chairman explain the rationale for excluding, from an international WHALING commission, a nation like Iceland with a demonstrated capacity to conduct high quality whale research and having the intention of resuming sustainable whaling from abundant stocks of non-endangered species? Given CITES past warnings to IWC about its lack of progress in resolving its internal difficulties, some CITES delegates will likely ask themselves: just how responsible, or credible, is IWC, when it excludes Iceland (whose request for membership was perfectly legal under the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties) but allows in Austria and Italy, whose stated purpose for joining IWC was to flout international law by subverting the IWC's underlying legal convention? Indeed, there is no precedent within IWC for rejecting Iceland's application, and in the past, both Chile and Peru were allowed to join IWC with reservations.
An interesting, if not important, research question might be to ask: how relevant is IWC in relation to its legal responsibilities to insure whales make a sustainable contribution to future global food supplies? This is a relevant question, as the human population increases toward 8 billion people in the next generation, as is the observation that IWC regulates the taking of about 375 whales each year -- a number that it does its best to reduce, rather than expand, as whale numbers and human needs continue to increase.
The past two issues of INWR Digest have reported on the continuing problems the pro- and anti-whaling factions at IWC have in resolving their differences. Whatever credibility the IWC retains at this time, could be further eroded unless a negotiated resolution of these differences can be achieved. The recently published book, Toward a Sustainable Whaling Regime (see below), details the problems faced by the IWC. As several contributors warn, as a dysfunctional international regime, IWC contributes to an irresponsible weakening of the rule of international law. Fortunately, other international bodies (including IUCN and CITES) aware of what is taking place, are urging IWC to face up to its international responsibilities as a formally-constituted whaling regime. These admonitions from organizations that support wildlife conservation and attract far larger government membership than does IWC, are having some effect. Witness the conflicting perspectives reported in this issue of INWR igest, on the recent IWC meeting held in Monaco to craft the text of the Revised Management Scheme. To the whaling nations, the meeting was a complete failure, due, they claim, to anti-whaling nations' unwillingness to negotiate in good faith. However, according to some anti-whaling campaigners attending the meeting, it seems there was much progress made, so much so they believe, that the whaling moratorium may be lifted in July 2001. To these observers, the only problems remain the uncompromising demands of whaling nations. However, the closeness of the possible resumption of whale-killing elicits no outrage, nor even a statement of regret, from the anti-whaling side. It seems that some on the anti-whaling side understand that as criticism of the IWC grows, and conservationists elsewhere becoming increasingly concerned about the IWC impasse, it becomes necessary to appear reasonable. Those whose actions may determine whether IWC remains or implodes might note the words of the distinguished American legal scholar (and whale protectionist) Professor Jon L. Jacobson who warns (in Towards a Sustainable Whaling Regime): "saving the whales might indeed be a noble objective, but those who reject or contort law in the attempt to achieve the goal are, in my view, aligned with all others who, for their own special causes are also willing to burn the (global) village to save it. Of course the village will not be saved; it will be ruined."
The International Network for Whaling Research (INWR) is an informal network of whaling researchers established following a whaling conference held in Aarhus, Denmark, in 1990. A number of whaling conferences were subsequently organized by INWR members: in Winnipeg, Canada (1991), Washington, DC (1992), Halifax, Canada (1994), Bodø, Norway (1995) and Berkeley, California (1996).
During the Berkeley meeting (attended by whaling-community representatives from Canada, Indonesia, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, Russia, St. Vincent & the Grenadines, Tonga, USA), a resolution calling for a World Council of Whalers (WCW) was passed. The World Council of Whalers [WCW] was established at a meeting in Vancouver, Canada, in 1997.
The WCW has convened three meetings (in Victoria, Canada, 1998; Reykjavik, Iceland, 1999; Nelson, New Zealand, 2000) that bring together whaling community representatives, fisheries managers and other government officials, parliamentarians, and researchers. The addition of these WCW conferences to the list of whaling research meetings held elsewhere (e.g. the Cologne-Bremerhaven Whaling Colloquia, Germany; High North Alliance, Norway; the Institute of Cetacean Research, Japan; Kendall Whaling Museum, Massachusetts, USA, etc) and a steady stream of books and other publications, and webpages, relating to whaling, has allowed INWR to focus its limited resources on publishing INWR Digest.
Readers are reminded that they can receive INWR Digest by sending an e-mail request to , or can read the INWR webpage . Printed copies of the Digest are sent gratis to libraries, and will be sent to individual readers sending a request and Can$10 (for Canadian readers) or US$10 (for non-Canadian mailings) to the Editor.
Many readers of INWR Digest have told us that, for them, the references to whaling publications are often the most useful and appreciated section in each issue. Most references we publish are scientific or scholarly articles or books, but more rarely we find a narrative that captures something of the essence of whaling. One such example is the recent book, Gift of the Whale, by Bill Hess, which sensitively describes contemporary Alaskan whaling. Hess successfully explains in words and photographs how and why whaling is important to individuals as members of a whaling community. He writes: "As I observed the food preparation, prayer, blanket toss, and traditional dancing -- and especially the pride on the faces of the captains and their families as they freely distributed the bounty the whale had given them to all who had come, and the happiness on the faces of those who received it -- I realized I was in the midst of something extraordinary and beautiful... in the catching of the bowhead whale and in the ancient traditions that go into the distribution and sharing of it, I did find something ideal." (p. 211). It is fortunate that there are writers who, whilst understanding what they observe, are able to convey the human emotions they observe and what these observations in turn cause them to think and feel. Our knowledge and understanding benefits from such honest personal reflections.
Recently, the Faroese government issued health advisories that recommend limits on the eating of whale meat and blubber. The reason appears to be the potential health risks associated with the contaminant levels found in whale meat and blubber obtained from the traditional grind (pilot whale drives). More recently, similar warnings have appeared in the Japanese press. Some years ago, alarming reports in Canada warned that PCB, mercury (and other contaminant) levels in seal and whale blubber, meat and organ meats exceeded safe levels. The health authorities initially suggested nursing mothers limit their consumption of seal and whale meat and blubber. Since those warnings more than a decade ago, a large body of scientific literature has been built up on the topic. In Canada cooperative research has involved consumers, community leaders and Inuit organizations working with medical, public health, nutrition, and environmental scientists, so that a wider, and more balanced, approach to the problem can be charted. Balance is necessary, because eating traditional food confers important cultural and health benefits at individual, family and societal levels, and these known benefits must be weighed carefully against any potential harm these foods may cause. Despite the known presence of many of these organochlorines (such as DDT, PCBs, chlordane etc) in arctic wildlife and people for about thirty years (and for mercury, far longer) no clinical evidence of harmful consequences exists at this time among arctic peoples -- in Alaska, Canada, or Greenland. A comprehensive scientific report (Canadian Arctic Contaminants Assessment Report, Ottawa, 1997) concludes "because the benefits of a traditional diet were well known and documented, whereas information about the human health risk posed by some of the contaminants... remains relatively uncertain... it is unnecessary to issue restrictive consumption guidelines." Research continues, as indeed it must when peoples= food security is thought to be at risk. In the interim, we all continue to live with varying degrees of risk in our everyday lives. Moreover, as the current France - U.K. continuing disagreement over the safety of British beef indicates, politics and emotion are also ever-present factors when scientific judgements are applied to public policy.
When thinking of contemporary whaling or whaling societies, one necessarily thinks of small coastal communities, even "endangered cultures". This situation was especially apparent at the meeting of the World Council of Whalers General Assembly held recently in Iceland. Delegates reported on small societies in the Arctic, the North Atlantic, the Caribbean, the North and South Pacific and Southeast Asia where, despite the small scale of whaling operations, a remarkable determination to continue this cultural adaptation was evident. Although many people from metropolitan regions may not understand the reasons for this, people from the regions in question certainly do. Professor Randy Thaman of the University of the South Pacific has noted "the development community does not clearly understand or support the fact that smallness, isolation and small-scale production can be positive... official development initiatives usually ignore or undermine such potential for autonomy in their drive to "integrate" rural communities into the "formal" global cash economy".
Indeed, it is not only economic security that is endangered by such ignorance: environmental and social integrity is also threatened. Tongan scholar Professor Epeli Hau'ofa has observed "we must go to the sea to save the land. A balanced development of our marine and ocean resources as well as those on land is the ideal" and "as we carry our past with us, we can dig into our heritage for clues to aid us in dealing with our present conditions... to deny the relevance of traditions in our lives is to repudiate our sources of knowledge, our cultures, our very selves. It is a prescription for getting lost..."
Thus, the current interest in maintaining or resuming whaling should be understood as reflecting a determination by many to retain or revitalize their valued national and cultural identities, and not surrender to hegemonic pressures to become individually and collectively diminished. Consequently it is not surprising that there exists a powerful attraction to whaling (or whale consumption -- for we are what we eat) among those who consider either as part of their cultural heritage and who want to avoid getting lost -- or who want to find their way back home.