Iceland firm plans huge whale meat export to Japan
REYKJAVIK —
Iceland’s fin whaling company plans a huge export of about 1,500 tons of whale meat, mainly to Japan, after wrapping up its hunting season for this year. Kristjan Loftsson, boss of company Hvalur, said the firm brought ashore 125 fin whales this season following a huge rise in the number of animals they were allowed to catch.
Last year the whalers were permitted to catch just nine fin whales—that figure rose to 150 for the 2009 season. “We have about 1,500 tons of frozen produce that we are preparing to export,” said Loftsson, with Japan the main customer.
Wire reports
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rajakumar
Iceland/Japan kings of whale meat production/comsumption.
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davidattokyo
Good news, almost all round. The Japanese weef (whale beef) consumers will be pleased indeed. Notwithstanding the negative impact to Japan's special permit whaling research activities due to Sea Shepherd's interference the last couple of years, this 1,500 ton import from Iceland will fill the supply gap nicely and likely result in both lower market prices and more outlets being able to land some of this produce for their customers.
The dolphin lovers should also be pleased as it should see demand for dolphin products reduced.
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Molenir
Sounds good to me.
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Azrael
Is this one step towards ending the "research whaling" charade?
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imacat
I thought Iceland had closed down... must have reopened for business. Nice of Japan to help them out.
It does seem that Japan is finally wising up to how ridiculous its Victorian-era style whale-grabbing expeditions to the pristine Antarctic are making it look and finally investigating other avenues.
What is difficult to understand is why Japan doesn't utilize the whales around its own waters more. That would fit in much better with Japan's constant cries about how important its whaling "food culture" is. And according to the Japanese government's own data there are an abundance of whales in the waters around Japan.
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davidattokyo
Azrael,
The charade that this might help bring an end to is the infantile 1970's scaremongering that catching whales causes their extinction. (This story has nothing to do with any nation's special permit activities)
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davidattokyo
imacat, not hard to understand - it's because Japan chooses to abide by the (silly) IWC moratorium on commercial whaling. I'm sure Japan would happily accept sustainable catch limits for whales in it's local waters if only the IWC would oblige and drop the out-dated moratorium. Of course Japan might decide to ignore the moratorium, but then there would be complaints from the usual areas about Japan breaking the rules (and they actually would be).
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