Second day of proceedings started with the discussions of the Agenda Item 4: REPORT OF THE INTERSESSIONAL CORRESPONDENCE GROUP (ICG) ON ISSUES RELATED TO THE SCIENTIFIC COMMITTEE (SC).

A panoply of affairs related to the SC presented by Greg Donovan, Countries started asking the Commission to be able to provide reports of the SC well before the IWC plenary. The current way things are processed; the Scientific Report is concluded and handed to the country delegations 48 hours prior and remains confidential until the plenary opening. Various countries argued that this manner is highly unproductive since the delegations cannot go through the approximately 800 pages in the time frame allowed and aren’t able to deliver recommendations and propose solutions. The commission will take this in consideration and will see what can be done to alter this.

Then discussions turned to the transparency and who should or shouldn’t be allowed presence at the SC meetings and so on. Australia did hold a stance wanting to be present at some of the SC discussions (and it was not allowed at some point), USA intervened saying that it welcomes observers, but there should be the opportunity for closed meetings of the procedure reviews and there is no plan on holding observers “because you don’t know how many will turn up if 4 or 84″ those were the words.

After Agenda Item 4 was closed opportunity was given to NGOs to speak. From all those I would like to sand out Dr. Sidney Holt’s speech, that you can access here. Talking about the crisis IWC faced, first in 1961 then 1973 he said that “We did learn, then, that short-term provisional “solutions” could lead to nasty long-term consequences”, referring to the almost extinction of blue, fin and humpback whales. “What crisis management really needed was for governments to have the will to change and to act in good faith. But promises to act definitively within a certain specified frame were repeatedly broken”. Whales indeed have a special status being highly migratory. Sidney evoked UNCLOS (Convention on the Law of the Sea) stating that fisheries must be managed in such way as to leave enough food for dependent species, such as cetaceans – not the other way around (Article 61.4 & 199.1 (b).

He also argued that the restoration of functionality requires the withdrawal of all “objections”". Another threat to Cetacean conservation is the “reservations” to CITES Appendix I listing. He finally welcomed the launching of the Southern Ocean research Partnership by the government of Australia, but said that was “a late start in producing a coherent management plan for the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary”.

After the NGO speakers finalized their interventions, the commission went into recess until the next morning and we warped it up by lunch time.

However I would like to make some personal considerations about some of the agenda items and a few topics that are quite hot on the IWC dealings.

1) Everyone is asking for the head of the current chair of the IWC Dr. William Hogarth due to the “whalergate case” (as Patrick Ramage was putting it). Basically Dr. Hogarth was forging a plan behind close-doors that would legitimize whaling on international waters compromising the conservation block and fundamentally the welfare of whales by undoing the global moratorium on commercial whaling. See IFAW press release here.
Even though I would like to see Dr. Hogarth pulled away from the Chair role of the IWC I would agree with the IFAW perspective that it wouldn’t be good policy or tactic. Being a USA Chair to remove him from his position would be highly damaging. If there is any country able to put a final mark on the whaling issue is the USA. And their citizens need a feeling of leadership, get rid of Dr. Hogarth would not just take the “savior complex” away but would also leave the feeling that “if we are not leading, it is not our problem, the other leader have to solve it not US!”

2) Coastal Whaling
As for many other terms the ICRW is not clear in defining Coastal Whaling. Dr. Sidney Holt put it very well on his Speech saying that “[the term] is dangerously ambiguous. Colloquially it means “near the shore”, but some governments seem to think it could mean “within 200-miles or even further”. That’s practically what Aristotle called a reduction ad absurdum, making whaling habit from the Barent Sea to the coast of Labrador the zone of “coastal whaling”. Further confusion comes from something called “Small-Type Whaling” (S-TCW), which is just an English translation of a Japanese administrative category by which catchers of less than 48 tons displacement are allowed to hunt small whales on one-day trips, that’s about 50 miles from base”
I really think this Coastal Whaling terminology need to be clarified in order for us to envisage what we are really dealing here with.

3) Junk-Science
JARPA (conducted in the Antarctic), JARPN (conducted on the north-west Pacific); the ongoing JARPA II and JARPN II are all part of the so-called scientific programs of the Japanese government conducted by the Institute of Cetacean Research (ICR), a privately-owned, non-profit institution. The institute receives its funding from government subsidies and Kyodo Senpaku, which handles processing and marketing of byproducts such as whale meat.

During JARPA for example, a program that took 18 years and after killing 6,778 minke whales it was attempted to determine the natural mortality rate, ‘M’.
In 2006 an expert workshop of scientists from the International Whaling Commission, meeting in Tokyo, agreed (including the Japanese scientists) that the natural mortality rate was not determined – the confidence limits around estimates of M from JARPA data were so wide that M remains effectively unknown. These were so wide that even a value of M=0 was not excluded. In other words, 18 years of lethal ‘research’ had been unable to exclude the possibility that minke whales might be immortal! (source: Greenpeace)

Today again we heard the IWC Head of Science Greg Donovan, say that there is not enough and reliable data to determine numbers and abundance of most of whale stocks, so I wonder after all this junk-science we still don’t have data to implement a RMP or anything at all? With over 200 scientists attending the SC meeting and so on producing huge amount of paper load to be analyzed 48 hours prior to the plenary opening, I ask: what have been the achievements of the SC?

4) The blurry fuzzy future
It is hard to make long-term strategies on this whaling affair. Most of the time, I feel we are only trying to fill in the holes, that the Japanese Government inflicts on the conservation movement. I strongly believe that the Small Working Group (SWG) has to be “blown-up”. It is circumventing the RMP (Revised Management Procedure), set in place (however, not applied) to make sure commercial whaling would be bond within safe and sustainable catch-limits based on sound-science. Now, the SWG is trying to come up with a package based on ad-hoc catch-limits, disregarding science and long-term sustainability all of this with an aura of compromise from the USA regarding Japan’s objectives.

Well, what are the Japanese objectives; anyone has any idea of what are these? If there is someone with a better and clearer idea is the USA government. We on the NGO platform are often blind-working trying to up-hold the conservation measures that the IWC imposed itself and is now thwarting, like the RMP and the Moratorium on Commercial Whaling.

Japan is still using its corruption loophole, here in Rome, Comoros was presented as an observer, obviously ready to join the circus of puppets Japan has bought in order to keep its simple majority, and the stalemate in place.

My work from now will be focused on avoiding some nations to join the IWC and support Japan, try to get one or two important countries and make sure they vote for conservation (if need be). Regarding the IWC 61 in Madeira I’ll be taking care of logistics and on-ground assistance; outreach network and information sharing coordination with NGOs and Civil Society; and work/provide information to Portuguese and International Media agencies based in Lisbon.

My feeling is that I’m just closing gaps and now making any dashing forward movements towards a resolution of the whaling issue.

The afternoon was spent walking around Rome, a long awaited moment since all my school days I was fascinated by Greek and Roman history. I walked a few kilometers around the city to discover things as I was going along, Coliseum, Arc of Triumph, roman Forum, Imperial Forum, Plaza de Venezia, Fontana de Trevi, Pantheon and other few bits.

At the end of my walkabout I joined a Tibetan Demo marking the 50th anniversary of the exile of the Dalai Lama in Dharmsala, India. March 10th marks the 50th anniversary of the failed Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule that sent the Dalai Lama into exile.

Dinner was at Da Giggetto, with Sidney, Vassili, Patrick, Georgan, and John, nice Roman meal to conclude the day.

It was a night with little sleep (about 3 hours) before I drove into Lisbon and my friend Susana took me to the airport. With a stopover in Madrid I got into Rome Fiumicino Airport around 19:00. Then took a taxi to the Hotel Santa Prisca where I’m staying. Dropped things there and went out for some food since the only thing I had eaten all day as breakfast, chose the closest one to the hotel, Trattoria “Perilli”. It was a strange experience since I do not speak Italian and didn’t know that you need to ask “all you want” on your plate separately so I ended up eating a Bisteca Manzo, that was nothing but a huge steak, followed by a Tiramisu. Went back to the hotel and dropped flat for some sleep.

It is difficult for me to get some decent sleep in cities, since I’m living on a very secluded place in the country side. So I spent the night waking up intermittently, and drinking loads of water due to the bedroom eating system that seems to dehydrate and try to take away all available water in my system.

Woke up today to get lost trying to find my way to the FAO headquarters, I started walking on the opposite direction, then manage to give myself a tour around before started ascending on the right direction through Via Piramide Ciesta and then Viale Aventino, until I reached Viale Terme Di Caracalla and the FAO headquarters.

Got my IFAW credentials and headed towards the venue. It seemed rather empty, but that was only because all NGOs were gathered at the cafeteria and I didn’t know about it! But soon people started to appear here and there, one of the very first I saw was Mammadou Diallo from WWF WARMER and dear colleague who has been giving a great help on my work in Africa, also after that I saw my dearest friend and mentor, Dr. Sidney Holt and my “PEW Boss” Leslie Busby. It was followed by many other included the other from the IFAW pack, Vassili Papastavrou and “IFAW Boss” Patrick Ramage.

All meeting was quite dull and we are not suppose to transmit whatever was said because it is confidential (quite ridiculous), we basically passed in review the 33 items the Small Working Group (SWG) has in hands following some comment on the future of the IWC by the Chairs; and that was the end of the first day. (read the “de Soto report” here)

After that we went down for dinner after the reception hosted by the Italian Government at the FAO headquarters where food and beverages were serve, we ended up in the same room that the Japanese Delegation having with us Sidney holt who appear on ECO calling them “Terrorists” and “Kidnapers”. Quite funny! After that I went down to my hotel and dropped dead at my small bed with a huge pillow :-)