Subject: Case Study: Japan iew on Whaling 3
Michael Williamson (whe_william)
Mon, 6 Jan 1995 08:06:31
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From: Michael Williamson <WHE_WILLIAM@FLO.ORG>
Subject: Case Study: Japan iew on Whaling 3
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Subj: WHALING: ANOTHER VIEW FROM JAPAN
Date: Thu, 5 Jan 1995 14:56:17 -0800
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From: Alan Macnow <amacnow@igc.apc.org>
Subject: WHALING: ANOTHER VIEW FROM JAPAN
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FROM: Alan Macnow
Consultant, Japan Whaling Association
For participants in this conference who are interested in
Japan's views on whaling, following is an article by Ms. Shigeko
Misaki, Counsellor, Institute of Cetacean Research, as published
in the opinion column of Asahi Shinbun, 27 Dec. 1994:
"CONSIDERATION OF THE WHALING ISSUE IN RELATION TO THE UNITED
NATIONS' LAW OF THE SEA CONVENTION"
The United Nations' Law of the Sea Convention (UNCLOS)
was ratified in mid-November, 1994. "A constitution for the
sea", as it is acknowledged by the global community, UNCLOS has
far-reaching effects in many aspects. Having attended various
international negotiations addressing whaling issues, I attempt
to put forward my view of the current situation at the Interna-
tional Whaling Commission (IWC) in relation to the UNCLOS.
The International Convention for the Regulation of Whal-
ing (ICRW), on which the IWC is founded, declares in its Pre-
amble to "provide for the proper conservation of whale stocks
and thus make possible the orderly development of the whaling
industry". In its Article VIII, the ICRW allows that "any Con-
tracting Government may grant to its nationals a special permit
authorizing that national to kill, take and treat whales for
purposes of scientific research".
In the recently ratified UNCLOS, Article 62 encourages
that "The Coastal States shall promote optimum utilization of
living resources" while in Article 65 it provides that States
shall co-operate with a view to the conservation of marine mam-
mals and in the case of cetaceans shall in particular work
through the appropriate international organizations for their
conservation, management and study".
It can be construed that both in ICRW and UNCLOS science
is the fundamental approach to the utilization of living
resources, and there is not much difference, in that sense, be-
tween the two.
In reality, however, the situation we face in the IWC is
far from the ideals with which UNCLOS and ICRW were written.
Let me examine the course of events that occurred at the IWC in
the recent decade.
Behind the fervent anti-whaling belief adhered to by the
majority members of the IWC, there is the spurring support of
wide-spread international "environmentalism", the basis of which
is a deep-seated distrust of science.
Distrust of science has begotten the ethics that nature
as it stands should be left alone so that no human hand should
touch its wild state. Such ethics was the basis of the
"Southern Ocean Sanctuary" adopted by the IWC in Mexico in June
1994.
However, dire distrust of science and technology can
lead to a collapse of human society in which our very own way of
living is structured. This is why I believe that development of
science and technology, hand in hand with rational conservation
in nature, including culling, is a task charged to humankind.
The Scientific Committee of the IWC, having toiled
through the maze of massive scientific demands for eight years,
has completed the Revised Management Procedure (RMP), the core
of the Comprehensive Assessment which was contingent to the
adoption of the 1982 moratorium.
The RMP is an epoch-making management regime with which
whale stocks, even in the case where information available is
uncertain, may be safely and steadily managed using a scenario
closest to the reality.
Use of RMP enables sustainable utilization of whale
stocks, when they are abundant enough to sustain harvesting,
without any damage to their population. Thus RMP is a most con-
servative approach to marine resource management, as it only
takes a very small portion of surplus out of the population in-
crease with careful periodical monitoring.
The IWC acknowledged the unanimous recommendation of its
Scientific Committee to adopt the RMP in 1992, but postponed its
implementation until such time as the "RMS" (Revised Management
System), which are administrative rules peripheral to the RMP,
is completed.
Faced with this political decision by the Commission,
Dr.Phil Hammond, the Chairman of the Scientific Committee,
resigned: he wrote to the Secretary of the IWC "what was the
point of having a Scientific Committee if its unanimous recom-
mendation on a matter of primary importance are treated with
such contempt?"
Since then, the works required for the RMS have been
steadily undertaken by a group of administrative representatives
of Japan, Norway and other IWC member nations. The writing of
the last part of a series of administrative rules, the interna-
tional observer scheme, necessary for implementation of the RMP
which will comprise the RMS, is expected to be complete at the
preparatory meeting to be held early next year.
The completion of the RMS has a great significance, be-
cause it means the achievement of all there is to do to satisfy
the contingent clause for the moratorium.
A reasonable conclusion may be drawn at this stage in
light of the concept of UNCLOS and ICRW as follows.
The IWC should lift the moratorium by adoption of the
RMS, so that rational and sustainable whaling may start. At the
same time, the IWC should "reconsider" its current anomaly with
which it condemns the research activities conducted by Japan and
Norway, since international co-operation of scientific studies
is called for by the new order of the sea.
Humankind will have to cope with the population explo-
sion in the foreseeable future. Sustainable utilization of
wildlife will be an effective way in which we can help resolve
the food shortage for the global human population. The time is
now to establish an international regime for the utilization of
surplus marine resources for the global food demands. We should
not regard the whaling issue as an isolated case. It should be
treated as a fundamental example of wise and sustainable
utilization of widelife and marine living resources.
-end-