Whale Season: Hunting and Watching

Summer's here, and with it, the beginning of whale watching season. This is one of the biggest selling points for tourism in Iceland, and already proving to be the country's fastest-growing and most profitable industry. With whale watching, all you really need is a boat, a phone number, and a cheap website, and you're in business. A business that attracts tens of thousands every year.

But summer also marks the beginning of whale hunting season. Unlike whale watching, whale hunting is far from profitable - in fact, it actually relies on government subsidies in the millions to stay afloat. Although the hunts are conducted for "scientific purposes", in order to comply with international law, the meat has to be sold. Do Icelanders eat whale? Sorely few, apparently: whale meat from 2003 is still sitting in cold storage, while a survey from earlier this year conducted by the International Fund for Animal Welfare showed that only 7.6% of Icelanders said they bought the meat once, 3.9% bought it twice and only 2.5% bought it three times. The national average is about 500 grammes per person per year.

In the face of this, Minister of Fisheries Einar K. Guðfinnsson still contends that commericial whaling should begin again. Even if you ignore the painful, hours-long death that each whale endures, commericial whaling makes absolutely no sense economically. Apart from the previously mentioned great costs and practically non-existent demand, whale hunting could also be hurting Iceland's most profitable business: the tourist industry.

In addition to the negative press Iceland gets every year from whale hunting, there's also the absurd practice of often hunting whales in the same places people are whale watching. Just last year, a whale watching boat full of tourists stumbled upon a stripped, floating whale carcass in Reykjavík harbour. One wonders what stories they'll be taking home with them. It's comparable to conducting safari hunts at the zoo.

Despite the largely symbolic vote at an International Whaling Commission conference last weekend of a slim majority deciding to lift the ban on commerical whaling, there is some hope for Iceland. Reuters reports that international conservation groups have redoubled their efforts to overturn the ruling. Also, the Icelandic Tourist Board has issued a statement calling for the cessation of the practice, especially as angry letters from around the world arrive at the tourist centres.

However you feel about the animal cruelty aspects of whale hunting, one thing has become painfully clear: the practice eats government money, has virtually no customer base, and is hurting the most profitable industry in Iceland. If appealing to the animal-lover side of government officials won't end whaling, maybe appealing to their love of the bottom line will.

Paul F Nikolov