The forth type of 'whaling'

A recent study showed that more than 300 J-stock minke whales have graced the tables of Japan and Korea. From both species conservation and a resource management view this is too large of a number to dismiss. It even exceeds the provisional quota proposed by the Chair on April 22nd this year, which is 160 for both coastal and offshore catches.

This kind of whale by-catch is caused by the fixed fishnet fishery, practiced along the coasts of Japan.

Read more: J-stock minke whales threatened: the reality of bycatch

Iruka & Kujira (Dolphin&Whale) Action Network welcomes the early end of the Second Phase of the Japanese Whale Research Program under Special Permit in the Antarctic (JARPAII). We hope this will become the opportunity for unemotional and constructive discussions to take place based on more extensive sharing of information within Japan, to ultimately forever cease from any research whaling activities in the Antarctic.

Read more: IKAN Welcomes the Early End of Research Whaling

Noda administration is trying to make up for the research whaling deficit with the national budget.

Research whaling has been conducted at a deficit for years that even the review panel of the Fisheries Agency recommended the possibility of halting or reducing the size of research whaling. Even then, the government is likely to give out an extra budget in addition to

Read more: Booklet: Research Whaling? It's Time to Finally Stop.

At an October 4^th press conference, the Japanese government announced it would carry out the fall term of research whaling in Antarctica, which was earlier cut short in February of this year.

The Institute of Cetacean Research (ICR), an organization that runs with the profit from whale meat sales and the 500 million yen annual government subsidy, conducts the research whaling. However the whaling operation has become a challenge recently, with the decrease in whale meat sales

Read more: Rescue ICR? not the victims of 3.11?