Taxpayers' money keeps Japan's whaling fleet afloat

NOT just cruel, but a waste of money too. Japanese government statistics reveal that the country's whaling fleet makes a loss and has to be subsidised by taxpayers.

According to a report by the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), Japan's whaling fleet has been unable to cover its costs since 2006. The Fisheries Agency of Japan has been propping it up with public money, giving 715 million yen ($8.9 million) in 2011.

"The argument for whaling is not economic," says marine biologist Leah Gerber of Arizona State University in Tempe, who is not affiliated with IFAW. She says whaling is bound up with national pride and a belief that eating the meat is part of cultural identity.

Demand for whale meat has been declining since the 1960s,however, and stockpiles of it are growing. An IFAW survey found that only 11 per cent of Japanese citizens support whaling. "The government is encouraging a market that doesn't exist," says Gerber. "It's not healthy to eat whales because they contain mercury, and people know that."

There has been a voluntary moratorium on commercial whaling since 1986, but Norway, Iceland and Japan have continued. Instead of the moratorium, Gerber proposes establishing a global market in which a whaling quota can be divided up and bid for (Nature, doi.org/fxs3tv). That way conservationists could buy up the quotas, likely saving more whales than they do by harassing whalers at sea.

This article appeared in print under the headline "Ailing whaling propped up"

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