WHALES ARE NEXT

ATTEMPTS to introduce limits on the fishing of bluefin tuna at the recent international meeting of the Commission for Endangered Species ended in failure -- or flawed compromise. Now the efforts of marine preservation lobbies move to Morocco in June for the annual meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC).

As usual this gathering of its 88 members will be split into four camps: those who want almost total preservation and only authorised culling of whales; those who want almost total freedom to continue whaling without limit on the size of the catch; those who have no strong interest in whaling but believe in playing a mediating role between the two main camps; and those who have been persuaded that their votes are important by one side or the other. The total preservationists, among which Australia is prominent, are mainly animated by non-governmental organisations such as Greenpeace; the no-restrictions group is tiny -- Japan, Norway and Iceland in that order of importance -- but extremely determined. In 1986 Japan found a loophole in the IWC moratorium on commercial whaling to justify taking about 1'000 whales a year for “scientific research”. Few people believe that the total killed by Japan is as little as 1'000 and even fewer have ever seen any report on the scientific research that has resulted. There is little chance of changing present agreements; the task is to prevent authorisation of higher catches.