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ENVIRONMENT: Latin America Unites to Defend Whales

Marcela Valente

BUENOS AIRES, Dec 4 2006 (IPS) - Opposition to commercial hunting of and lethal scientific research on whales and dolphins has brought together 12 Latin American countries, which have begun to discuss a future regional agreement for preservation, in opposition to the Japanese-led bloc of countries that defend hunting.

Civil society organisations fighting to protect whale species have been working “hand in hand” with government representatives with the aim of “overcoming the defeat” suffered by the conservationist bloc at the last International Whaling Commission (IWC) meeting, held in St Kitts and Nevis in June, activist Roxana Schteinbarg told IPS.

Although the moratorium on whale hunting for commercial purposes adopted in the mid-1980s was left in place at the meeting, Japan obtained 50 percent plus one vote in favour of a declaration aimed at expanding hunting.

Schteinbarg complained that Japan “is recruiting votes in favour of commercial hunting among small, poor countries in the Caribbean in exchange for fishing subsidies.” That is why there is fear that at the coming IWC meeting, to be held next May in Alaska, Japan will obtain the two-thirds support it needs to put an end to the moratorium, she added.

The possibility of a regional accord emerged at the Latin American conference for the conservation of cetaceans, held Friday in the Argentine capital. Participating in the meeting were the delegates of IWC member nations Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Guatemala, Mexico, Panama and Peru, along with representatives of Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Uruguay and Venezuela, which are observer nations.

“It was an unprecedented meeting that brought together Latin America as a bloc in favour of the non-lethal use of cetaceans,” said Schteinbarg, coordinator of Argentina’s Whale Conservation Institute (ICB).

The participants expressed their opposition to commercial hunting and lethal scientific research, and agreed on the need to encourage the development of the whale-watching industry, which according to experts broadly surpasses the economic and environmental benefits of whale hunting.

Chile’s ambassador to the IWC, Jorge Berguño, warned that the indiscriminate hunting of whales has pushed them to the verge of extinction.

Mexican delegate Lorenzo Rojas explained that “it’s not a question of defending whales because they’re pretty, but because of the role they play in the global ecosystem.”

Never before had a regional conservationist bloc met to counteract the pressure of countries in favour of whale hunting, especially Japan, Iceland and Norway.

The participating Latin American nations also urged other countries in the region to join the IWC. “We are working for Costa Rica and Uruguay to return to the IWC, and to make observers Colombia, Ecuador and Venezuela full members,” said Schteinbarg. “That would give Latin America a majority of votes in the IWC,” she added.

After Friday’s meeting in the Argentine capital, the Latin American delegates presented their conclusions alongside representatives of the IWC, the Argentina-based Cethus Foundation, the Uruguayan Organisation for the Conservation of Cetaceans, and the Brazilian chapter of the World Society for the Protection of Animals.

“The conservationist countries agreed to begin negotiations for a Latin American agreement on the non-lethal use of cetaceans, and to forge ahead with the idea of creating a whale sanctuary in the South Atlantic,” said Argentine IWC commissioner Eduardo Iglesias.

Iglesias, who served as president of the IWC in 1983, said an accord among the region’s countries would “strengthen the position” of the Latin American members of the organisation.

The IWC, which currently has 71 member countries, has regulated whale hunting since 1946. The measures it can adopt include the complete protection of a given species, the establishment of whale sanctuaries where hunting is banned, and incentives for scientific research.

Although it was created by whale-hunting countries, the IWC later incorporated members seeking a ban on hunting and in favour of the sustainable use of marine mammals for non-invasive research and whale-watching, which has been a lucrative source of foreign exchange for developing nations.

The new members forced the comission to issue a worldwide moratorium on whale hunting for anything other than scientific purposes. The countries that defend hunting are demanding the lifting of the moratorium, while they continue hunting under the pretext of “scientific purposes.”

The conservationist nations note that since the 17th century, the number of southern right whales, for example, has plunged from 200,000 to 6,500, and point out that whale watching not only preserves biodiversity and allows endangered or threatened species to recover, but also moves a total of 1.5 billion dollars a year in 90 countries.

In Argentina, the number of whale-watching visitors to the city of Puerto Madryn in the southern province of Chubut climbed from 17,000 a year in 1991 to nearly 100,000 today.

In November 2005, just as a Japanese fleet of scientific whale hunting vessels set out for the Antarctic, 13 countries of the southern hemisphere, plus Spain, signed the “Buenos Aires Declaration” supporting the moratorium and reaffirming the member nations’ right to use and manage whales through non-lethal means, in particular whale watching and benign research.

The group, which included Latin American countries as well as Australia, Spain, New Zealand and South Africa, also decided to coordinate regional protection policies in IWC meetings. Friday’s meeting was a result of that agreement.