Some time ago I wrote a post about my optimism in relation to Japan cuts on government spendings and how I thought the world economical crisis would solve the whaling problem.
Well, forget all that!!
Later some Japanese official in a visit to Australia, assured that the whaling program was not under revision, and that Japan was still pursuing their intents at the International Whaling Commission (IWC).
Now I’m not just worried with Japan but with the IWC all together! The Small Working Group (SWG), a sub-group inside the IWC assign to cut a deal between the parties and solve the whaling issue, came up with unthinkable solutions.
Sidney Holt, my tutor-guru-mentor, looked into it:
In my view the suggestions made by the IWC Chairman on the basis of advice from the CSG and SAG constitute a move back towards the situation of the IWC in its earliest days – the 1950s – and tend to nullify most of the advances made in conservation and management of whaling since then. In 1961 – my first year of attendance at the IWC – there was a virtual monopoly of large-scale factory-ship whaling in the Antarctic, held by five nations; a catch limit was set without benefit of scientific input at a level economically convenient for the five national whaling fleets; participation by “civil society” and the media was not permitted and even the Verbatim Records of the IWC’s meetings were kept secret for many years (after some decades of making such records public the IWC no longer publishes them, thus impeding historical analysis).In my view the suggestions made by the IWC Chairman on the basis of advice from the CSG and SAG constitute a move back towards the situation of the IWC in its earliest days – the 1950s – and tend to nullify most of the advances made in conservation and management of whaling since then. In 1961 – my first year of attendance at the IWC – there was a virtual monopoly of large-scale factory-ship whaling in the Antarctic, held by five nations; a catch limit was set without benefit of scientific input at a level economically convenient for the five national whaling fleets; participation by “civil society” and the media was not permitted and even the Verbatim Records of the IWC’s meetings were kept secret for many years (after some decades of making such records public the IWC no longer publishes them, thus impeding historical analysis).
The Palmer-Donovan Plan would legitimise and confine whaling for at least ten years to the three countries that still deny the IWC’s 1982 decision to pause all commercial whaling until certain conditions were met (those conditions have not yet been met) as a result of which five whaling nations dismantled their industries, forwent their profits and disbanded their work forces.The rationale of the P-D plan is that it would prevent any further escalation of the activities of three whaling countries, but that belief is, for me an expression of naive optimism, no matter how fine the intentions might be, and the price to be paid for embarking on a tten year voyage on this leaky ship (mutiny prohibited) is unbearably high.
The Palmer-Donovan Plan was recently discussed at a meeting in Florida of representatives of nearly thirty countries (only about one-third of the IWC’s Membership) constituting a “Small Working Group”. This was very ably and fairly chaired by Ambassador Anthony Liverpool, Commissioner for Antigua & Barbuda (The IWC Chairman was absent because of the terrible earthquake event in Chile) and was attended by Observers from non-governmental organisations but not the media; for the first time since the 1970s Observers were given opportunities to address the meeting. The SWG’s Report will be considered – perhaps together with a new version of the Chairman’s Report on the CSG – for decision by the IWC at a full Annual Meeting in Morocco in June 2010. That meeting will be open to Observers from civil society and to the media.
Dr. Holt identifies 10 reasons for Concern about the IWC Chair’s suggestions regarding the future of the IWC (the “Plan”). And for vigorously opposing its adoption at the forthcoming meeting of the IWC in Morocco.
1. It envisages continued whaling in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary;
2. It rejects the Precautionary Principle that was pioneered by the IWC in 1976;
3. It applies ten-year “block quotas”, that were disastrous in the 1970-80s, even for four or six years only;
4. It ignores the consequences of inevitable changes in IWC Membership and/or attendance during the ten “interim” years;
5. It is unfair to ex-whaling countries that accepted the 1982/86 “moratorium”;
6. There are no provisions to enforce or even encourage a ban on or limitation of international trade in commodities from whales;
7. It contemplates authorizing the killing of sperm whales.
8. It undermines the role of international law in conserving and managing the use of living resources of the sea, particularly of the High Seas and Highly Migratory Species;
9. It weakens the IWC;
10. It fails to recognize global changes in public perception of whales and whaling and will encourage actions outside the IWC’s orbit.