International Whaling Commission Totally Explained

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The International Whaling Commission (IWC) was set up by the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling (ICRW) on 2 December 1946 to promote and maintain whale fishery stocks, as well as maintain prices for whale-derived products. The structural design of the IWC rested on the hope that states in their long-term self-interest would adopt cooperative policies suggested by expert scientific management of a common resource. Since the 1980s the IWC has become the primary mechanism for the protection of all species of whale. The change in the IWC's institutional mission began in the early 1970s, and is often linked with the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment at Stockholm in 1972. The result of this shift is most evident in the IWC's adoption of a five-year moratorium on commercial whaling, which commenced in 1986 and has been extended to the present, and in the IWC's recent designation of the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary.
The protective role the IWC has taken has come under strain since the late 1980s, as various species of Minke Whale were argued to be sufficiently populous to allow commercial hunting. The sharp controversy between those who wish to resume commercial whaling and those who have for the most part successfully opposed it has, as one consequence, led the pro-whaling nations to question the IWC's decisions.

Structure and membership

The IWC was created by voluntary agreement among the member nations to function as the sole governing body with authority to act under the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling and to implement its economic and environmental goals. The role of the Commission is to periodically review and revise the Schedule to the Convention, controlling the conduct of whaling by setting the protection of certain species; designating areas as whale sanctuaries; setting limits on the numbers and size of catches; == I HEART WHALES == prescribing open and closed seasons and areas for whaling; methods and intensity of whaling, types of gear to be used, methods of measurement and maximum catch returns. Under its constitutive document, the IWC is given the task of adopting regulations "to provide for the conservation, development, and optimum utilization of the whale resources" with the condition that such regulations "shall be based on scientific findings."
   The headquarters of the IWC is in Cambridge, England. The Commission has three main committees — Scientific, Technical, and Finance and Administration.
   Participation in the IWC isn't limited only to states involved in whaling. In 2007 there were 77 members.
   Traditionally, the IWC meets annually, usually in May or June. Meetings are composed of one voting representative (called a Commissioner) from each state party who may be accompanied by experts and advisors. They are generally extremely divisive — demonstrating a complete split on all major issues between the pro-whaling nations and their supporters and the anti-whaling nations. The IWC's Rules of Procedure allow non-parties and intergovernmental organisations to attend the meetings and to be represented by observers if they've submitted a written request to the Secretary thirty days before the meeting or if they've attended previous meetings. Non-governmental organisations that maintain offices in more than three countries may also attend the annual meetings of the IWC.

Annual meetings

Members of the IWC started meeting regularly in 1969. During the first 20 years, most annual meetings were held in the United Kingdom. Starting in the late 1980s, the responsibility of hosting the meeting has been shared among the members. For a complete list of the host cities, see Sites of International Whaling Commission annual meetings.

Year	Dates	City	Subarticle	Web Link
2000	3 - 6 July	Adelaide		IWC
2001	23-27 July	London		IWC
2002	20-24 May	Shimonoseki		IWC
2003	16-20 June	Berlin		IWC
2004	19-22 July	Sorrento		IWC
2005	20-24 June	Ulsan	IWC meeting in 2005	IWC
2006	16-20 June	Frigate Bay	IWC meeting in 2006	IWC
2007	28-31 May	Anchorage	IWC meeting in 2007	IWC
2008	23-27 June	Santiago	IWC meeting in 2008	IWC

Evolution of the IWC

From its inception until the late 1960s, the IWC attempted to maintain world commercial whaling through a system of quotas in an effort to allow individual whale stocks to replenish in number. During the first twenty-five years of the IWC's existence, the organization oversaw the continued overexploitation and depletion of whale stocks. The recommendations of the IWC Scientific Committee at that time, environmentalists allege, were distorted and ignored by the whaling states. As a result, "whale stocks were regularly over-exploited, and scientific advice concerning sustaining catch limits was frequently ignored. When populations were finally protected from further hunting, it was usually after they'd already collapsed."
It was revealed in 1994 that the Soviet Union had been systematically under-reporting the number of whales it took. For example, from 1948 to 1973, the Soviet Union killed 48,477 Humpback Whales rather than the 2,710 it officially reported to the IWC. On the basis of this new information, the IWC stated that it would have to rewrite its catch figures for the last forty years. According to Ray Gambell, the Secretary of the IWC at the time, the organisation had raised its suspicions of under-reporting with the former Soviet Union, but it didn't take further action because it couldn't interfere with national sovereignty.
The 1970s saw the beginning of the global anti-whaling movement. In 1972 the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment at Stockholm adopted a proposal that recommended a ten-year moratorium on commercial whaling to allow whale stocks to recover. The reports of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species in 1977 and 1981 identified many species of whales as being in danger of extinction. Finally, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, completed in 1982, provided inter alia that
A number of non-whaling and anti-whaling states joined the Convention and eventually gained a majority over number of pro-whaling nations. Nations like the United States, previously considered major whaling forces, became strong proponents of the anti-whaling cause. These nations called for the IWC to reform its policies and to incorporate newly discovered scientific data regarding whales in its proposed regulations.

The 1986 moratorium

On 23 July 1982 the IWC voted with the necessary three-quarters majority to implement a pause on commercial whaling by adding the following paragraph to the schedule:
   Japan, Norway, Peru and the Soviet Union (later replaced by Russia) lodged objections, since the moratorium wasn't based on advice from the Scientific Committee. Japan and Peru later withdrew their objections. In 2002 Iceland was allowed to rejoin IWC with a reservation to the moratorium (Iceland withdrew from IWC in 1992), but this reservation isn't recognised as a valid objection by Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Chile, Finland, France, Germany, Monaco, Netherlands, Peru, Portugal, San Marino, Spain, Sweden, UK, and the USA. Italy, Mexico and New Zealand also objected to the reservation and noted that they don't consider the Convention to be in force between their countries and Iceland. None of these countries, however, has mounted any legal challenge to Iceland's membership of the IWC.
   However, the Convention grants two exemptions: scientific whaling and aboriginal whaling. Since 1994, Norway, has been whaling commercially and Iceland began hunting commercially in September 2006. Since 1986, Japan has been whaling under scientific research permits. The US and several other nations are whaling under aboriginal whaling auspices. Norway lodged a protest to the zero catch limits in 1992 and isn't bound by them. Anti-whaling countries and lobbies accuse Japan's scientific whaling of being a front for commercial whaling. The Japanese government argues that the refusal of anti-whaling nations to accept simple head counts of whale population as a measure of recovery of whale species justifies its continuing studies on sex and age of population distributions, and further points out that IWC regulations specifically require that whale meat obtained by scientific whaling not go to waste. Japan, on the other hand, has raised objections to U.S. aboriginal subsistence whaling, generally seen to be in retaliation to anti-whaling nation's (including the US's) objections to aboriginal subsistence whaling for several Japanese fishing communities, which traditionally hunted whales until the imposition of the moratorium.
   In May 1994, the IWC also voted to create the 11.8 million square mile Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary. The vote to adopt the sanctuary resolution was twenty-three in favour, one opposed and six abstaining.

Enforcement under the IWC

There are substantial constitutional limitations on the IWC's authority as to both lawmaking and compliance. First, the IWC isn't based on international treaty, and therefore, any member countries are free to simply leave the organisation and declare themselves not to be bound by it if they so wish. Second, the IWC's power to "legislate" a moratorium or quotas is very restricted, because any member state may opt out of a quota or moratorium simply by objecting to it. Third, the IWC has no authority or means to enforce any quotas, even on states that voluntarily put themselves under them.

The opt-out provision

The ICRW provides for a prolonged objection procedure that allows one state to delay implementation of a regulation in all member states for three months. In addition, by simply lodging a timely objection, the state itself is completely exempted from the regulation. Specifically, Article V(3) states:

The scientific research exception

Pursuant to Article VIII, paragraph 1 of the Convention, any country that wishes to conduct scientific research on whales may invoke the scientific research provision as an exception to an IWC regulation.

Aboriginal subsistence whaling exception

The IWC says that aboriginal subsistence whaling "is of a different nature to commercial whaling. This is reflected in the different objectives for the two. For aboriginal subsistence whaling these are to:

ensure risks of extinction not seriously increased (highest priority);
enable harvests in perpetuity appropriate to cultural and nutritional requirements;
maintain stocks at highest net recruitment level and if below that ensure they move towards it."

In order for a country to carry out a hunt under the aboriginal group clause, the nation must provide the IWC with evidence of "the cultural and subsistence needs of their people." In particular the hunt isn't intended for commercial purposes and the caught meat can't be exported.

Politics

There has been concern that the conflict between those who seek renewed utilisation of whales and those who seek protection for every whale has placed a dangerous strain on the IWC. Oran Young and eight other noted scholars in the field asserted that "changes in the current [IWC] arrangements are inevitable," and that "the killing of whales for human consumption will continue, whether whalers operate within a reconstructed international whaling regime, opt to join alternative arrangements like NAMMCO, or seek to establish a hybrid system."

Allegation of politicising science

The pro-whaling nations accused the IWC of basing these decisions upon "political and emotional" factors, rather than upon scientific knowledge. These nations allege that the IWC prohibits all whaling, even though some in the scientific community have concluded that limited hunting of Minke Whales might be sustainable. They argue the IWC has swayed from its original purpose and is attempting, under the guise of conservation, to grant whales an entitlement to life, absolute protection from being killed by humans for commercial purposes.
   Non- IWC whaling nations have expressed similar sentiments. Canada withdrew from the IWC after the vote to impose the moratorium, claiming that "[t]he ban was inconsistent with measures that had just been adopted by the IWC that were designed to allow harvests of stocks at safe levels."
   After the moratorium entered into force in 1986, the Scientific Committee was commissioned to review the status of the whale stocks and develop a calculation method for setting safe catch limits. At the annual meeting of the IWC in 1991, the Scientific Committee submitted its finding that there are approximately 761,000 Minke Whales in Antarctic waters, 87,000 in the northeast Atlantic, and 25,000 in the North Pacific. With such populations, it was submitted, 2000 Minke Whales could be harvested per year without endangering the population. Nevertheless, the IWC Plenary committee voted to maintain the blanket moratorium on whaling, noting that formulas for determining allowable catches hadn't yet been adequately evaluated.
   In 1991, acting on the recommendation of the Scientific committee, the IWC adopted a computerised formula, the Revised Management Procedure (RMP), for determining allowable catches of some whale species. Despite the fact that the RMP indicated that it would be possible to authorize a catch that year, the moratorium wasn't lifted. The IWC noted the need to agree on minimum standards for data, to prepare guidelines on the conduct of population surveys, and to devise and approve a system of measures for monitoring and inspection.
   The IWC Plenary committee adopted the RMP in 1994, but decided not to implement it before an inspection and control scheme had been developed. This scheme, together with the RMP, is known as the Revised Management Scheme (RMS). Since then it has been all but impossible for the member countries in the Plenary committee to agree on an RMS.
   Frustrated by this delay in the return to commercial whaling, with no sign of agreement on the RMS in sight, pro-whaling countries have accused some hard-line anti-whaling countries, such as United Kingdom and New Zealand, of not negotiating in good faith, insinuating that they're filibustering the adoption of an RMS by introducing unrealistic demands that will make the RMS unworkable. The accused countries respond by claiming that they only want to make sure best practices will be followed and that it's the pro-whaling countries that show unwillingness to compromise. These anti-whaling countries, which want the moratorium to be permanent, also face questions why they're participating in the discussions in the first place, since the whole objective of the RMS is to regulate commercial whaling. Their response is that the RMS and the moratorium are two separate issues, and should the moratorium be lifted against their will, they want the best possible management scheme in place. Thus a politically awkward situation could arise where the RMS and the moratorium co-exist.
   Australia is the only member country of IWC who has officially announced its opposition to any RMS and is therefore not participating in the discussions. Anti-whaling NGOs, such as Greenpeace, are also generally against the RMS.
   Ray Gambell, then the Secretary of the IWC, agreed at least in part with the argument of the pro-whaling nations: "In all reasonableness, we'd have to say that a commercial catch could be taken without endangering [Minke] stocks." In June 1993 the Chairman of the Scientific Committee, Dr Philip Hammond, resigned in protest to what he saw as contempt of the Scientific Committee’s recommendations. The same year Norway became the only state in the world to resume commercial whaling, on the grounds that they'd objected to, and thus opted out, of the moratorium.

IWC Membership

The purpose of the IWC as specified in its constitution is "in safeguarding for future generations the great natural resources represented by the whale stocks;" and the original members consisted only of the 15 whale-hunting nations. However, since the late 1970s and early 1980s, many countries which have no previous history of whaling (some of which are landlocked such as Switzerland and Mongolia) have joined the IWC. This shift was first initiated by Sir Peter Scott, the then head of the World Wildlife Fund. Labelling the IWC a "butchers' club", he mounted lobbying campaigns in developed countries with support from the green lobby and anti whaling block of IWC members to change the composition of the IWC's membership, which was instrumental in obtaining the necessary three-quarters majority vote to implement the moratorium on commercial whaling in 1986. This campaign triggered the first accusations of vote-buying in IWC. According to Scott's biographer, Elspeth Huxley, China's decision to join was influenced by a World Wildlife Fund promise to provide $1 million to fund a panda reserve. Dr. Michael Tillman, former IWC Commissioner of the United States, said in a radio interview that "there was what we called 'common knowledge,' that a number of countries joined and that their dues and the travel support was reportedly due to conservation groups providing it. So that, in a sense, one could say that the conservation groups set out a strategy that the Japanese copied."
Since the moratorium was adopted, the support for it has dropped from a 75% majority to a 50-50 split, with many of the countries initially recruited by the anti-whaling side now voting with the pro-whaling block. (A 75% majority is needed to overturn the moratorium.) Anti-whaling campaign groups and some governments claim that the Japanese Fisheries Agency has carried out a programme of "vote-buying" - for example offering aid to poorer countries in return for them joining the IWC and supporting Japanese positions on whaling. Japan claims, however, that this accusation itself is politically motivated because Japan's oversea aids are not only given to pro-whaling countries. Japan has given US$320 million in overseas aid to Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, Guinea, Morocco, Panama, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, St Kitts and Nevis and the Solomon Islands. Caribbean countries have consistently sided with Japan in each IWC vote since 2001 though the Caribbean nations admit the rules may possibly impact on their fishing activities as well. Pacific countries' voting patterns vary even for each motion, as they're lobbied by neighbouring pro-whaling Japan and anti-whaling New Zealand and Australia. Greenpeace alleges that Japan's aid activities and these countries voting patterns are correlated. These allegations of tying aid to votes are based on public admissions by government officials both inside and outside Japan, as well as an analysis of voting patterns compared to Japanese Fisheries Aid received. In 2005, The Environmental Investigation Agency approached Lord Ashcroft of the UK to use his influence in Belize to assure support for the anti whaling camp. It was reported that Ashcroft paid Belize's IWC subscription fees (External Link

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Both sides accuse each other of using underhanded tactics to pack the commission with countries sympathetic to their position (either pro- or anti-). Edwin Snagg, the IWC commissioner for St Vincent and the Grenadines stated, "It's a question of respect,....Because you're small and because you're underdeveloped there's this view and there's this feeling that you can easily be bought and you can easily be sold. We in the Caribbean feel highly offended." Moreover, there are non-developed countries who support an anti-whaling stance. The BBC reported that "Some countries recently admitted to the European Union have been advised by a "word in the ear" that it would be "a good idea" for them to join the IWC. Some activists believe that Britain and its fellow EU old-timers such as France and Germany should recruit all member states into the Commission." In New Zealand, National Nine News reported that "New Zealand is questioning pro-whaling support among Pacific Island states with the opposition calling for a rethink of foreign aid." It is expected that more countries in the future will join IWC including some landlocked countries. Currently, there are 8 landlocked IWC members. Mali and Mongolia voted with other pro-whaling countries. Austria, the Czech Republic, Luxembourg, Slovakia, Switzerland and San Marino voted with other anti-whaling countries.
   Both pro- and anti-whaling countries claim that their recruiting activities are restricted to lobbying and persuasion based on the merits of their cause. Anti-whaling campaigners argue that scientific studies are not currently clear enough to warrant resumption of commercial whaling. Moreover there are various other issues such as welfare of whales which is beyond the simple matter of conservation. (See The arguments for and against whaling) These issues have global relevance which isn't restricted only to whaling and whaling countries. Moreover, public opinion in many anti-whaling countries is solidly behind the governmental position on whaling within the IWC. Pro-whaling countries, on the other hand, argue that the public's anti-whaling stance is often based on misinformation. A poll commissioned and financed by the Japanese government indicated that most Australians think there's only one species of whale which is endangered.
   Moreover, coastal countries have a vested interest in conserving their fish stocks which may be threatened by whales (this claim is strongly contested by the anti-whaling lobby). Japan, particularly when lobbying African nations, argues that diversification of the anti-whaling argument outside of conservation is a threat to their national interest. Exploitation of wildlife resources (such as elephant ivory, sea turtles or primates) are restricted supposedly on the ground of sustainable management. Alleged filibustering of the Revised Management Scheme and diversification of arguments outside of conservation by the anti-whaling side is alleged to be a sign that anti-whaling countries no longer adhere to this principle (of sustainable management and exploitation of natural resources). The Japanese argue that the African countries and whaling countries have a shared interest in preventing the principle of sustainable management being exploited as a cover for animal rights arguments:
When allegations of vote-buying by Japan were aired at the London IWC meeting in 2001 by the New Zealand delegate to the commission, Sandra Lee-Vercoe, the Japanese delegate unsurprisingly denied the allegations:
Komatsu also said that Caribbean countries naturally supported pro-whaling resolutions as they're whaling countries themselves (mostly of smaller cetaceans) and that the New Zealand commissioner was inventing "fairy stories".
   In response to this rebuttal, anti-whaling groups cite several statements who argue otherwise. In an interview reported in The Observer newspaper in May 2001, Atherton Martin, Dominica's former Environment and Fisheries Minister who publicly oppose whaling, said:
Greenpeace also quotes Tongan parliamentarian Samiu K Vaipulu as saying at a workshop on the proposed South Pacific Whale Sanctuary in Samoa that Japan had linked whale votes to aid. Lester Bird, prime minister of Antigua and Barbuda, had said:

   In an interview with Australian ABC television in July 2001, Japanese Fisheries Agency official Maseyuku Komatsu described that Minke Whales as "cockroaches of the sea". The Sydney Morning Herald reported that he further stated "lacking military might, his country had to use the tools of diplomacy and promises of development aid to "get appreciation of Japan's position" on whaling. Billions of money have flowed to countries that joined the IWC from both pro and anti whaling countries. "It already brings back the time when we were colonised," says Clarice Charles, of Grenada. "Would these rich nations give a poor fisherman a revolving loan or a grant or a gift so that he can buy [atourist boat] to go whale watching?"
   In Japan, especially within conservative media outlets (the most vocal ones being Sankei Shimbun and Bungei Shunju), it's argued that countries which oppose commercial whaling altogether shouldn't be in the IWC at all and allege that the anti-whaling side has subverted the purpose of the IWC by exploiting the (lack of) membership requirements. Moreover, they point out that the anti-whaling lobby within the IWC are also led by wealthy developed nations and are equally susceptible to accusations of vote-buying and influence-peddling. The anti-whaling side within IWC are accused of using conservation as a cover for their ideological opposition to whaling itself, which mirrors the accusation from the anti-whaling side that Japan's scientific whaling is a cover for commercial whaling. Since 2000, 29 new countries have joined the IWC, 18 of them pro-whaling, 11 anti. Japan notes that major anti-whaling nations such as the U.S. Australia, UK and New Zealand also donate aid to poor countries on the IWC and wield far more influence than Japan alone and thus they could easily be accused of the same tactics. Moreover, Japan is pushing to have secret ballot voting. Had the allegations of vote-buying been true, such proposal would run counter to its alleged objective because it's impossible to monitor so called client members' vote. From Japan's point of view, secret ballot voting is the only way to counter the influence pedling of anti whaling side which Japan see as having more powerful collective influence within the IWC. One of the new 2006 members, Israel, currently receives more than 3 billion dollars a year in aid from the United states and who voted consistently with the anti-whaling bloc, was asked specifically to join by the US. Belize, a country previously accused of having their vote bought and paid for by Japan by a number of countries and NGO's, shifted side and consistently voted with the anti-whaling block at the 2006 IWC meeting. Anti-whaling nations oppose secret ballot voting on the grounds that it's without precedent in other international bodies and would have removed accountability and made behind-the-scenes deals between delegations more likely. St Kitts and Nevis Commissioner, Cedric Liburd, pointed out to various anti whaling counties during debate on the secret ballot vote on the first day of the 2006 meeting in St Kitts that it was extremely hypocritical of such countries to pontificate on the need for transparency within the IWC by open voting when such countries quite happily voted via secret ballot in CITES, a similar management body.

Role of the United States

The effectiveness of IWC decisions (at least on smaller whaling states) may be explained in large part by the fact that the United States was willing to act unilaterally in support of them. The pro whaling nations often see the U.S.'s propensity to act outside the IWC framework as "bullying" tactics, while the green and the conservation lobby tend to applaud the U.S.
The United States first incorporated the IWC's régime into domestic law in the 1971 Pelly Amendment to the Fisherman's Protective Act of 1967. This amendment provides that when the Secretary of Commerce determines that the nationals of a foreign country are diminishing the effectiveness of an international fishery conservation program (including the IWC's program), the Secretary shall certify this fact to the President. The President then has the discretion to ban importation of fishing products from the offending country. The United States has threatened sanctions under the Pelly Amendment on a number of occasions. In November 1974, pressure from the United States contributed to Japan and the Soviet Union complying with the 1974-1975 quotas. Similarly, in December 1978, Chile, South Korea and Peru acceded to the IWC as a result of the U.S's threats to certify them under the Amendment. The threatened certification of Spain also led that country to observe a Fin Whale quota to which it had objected.
These measures were further strengthened by the 1979 Packwood-Magnuson Amendment to the Fishery Conservation and Management Act of 1976. It provides that, when the Secretary of Commerce certifies that a country is diminishing the effectiveness of the work of the IWC, the Secretary of State must reduce that country's fishing allocation in U.S. waters by at least 50%. Certification under the Packwood-Magnuson Amendment also serves as certification under the Pelly Amendment. The threatened application in 1980 of the Packwood-Magnuson and Pelly Amendments led South Korea to agree to follow IWC guidelines restricting the use of cold (for example, non-explosive) harpoons. Faced with similar pressure, the Republic of China (Taiwan) placed a complete ban on whaling in 1981. Without United States support, it's possible that the 1986 moratorium would have been substantially limited, as nations such as Iceland, Japan, Norway and the Soviet Union would have opted out and continued commercial whaling.

North Atlantic Marine Mammal Commission

The moratorium on commercial whaling led Iceland to withdraw in protest from IWC, as it had threatened to do if the moratorium was extended. Both Japan and Norway also threatened to leave the organisation. In April 1992, the North Atlantic Marine Mammal Commission (NAMMCO) was established by the Faroe Islands, Greenland, Iceland and Norway under the Agreement on Cooperation in Research, Conservation and Management of Marine Mammals in the North Atlantic. The document clearly responded to what the drafters regarded as inappropriate whale protectionist tendencies of the IWC. Guðmundur Eiríksson of Iceland stated at NAMMCO's inaugural meeting that the organisation was established in part out of dissatisfaction with the IWC's zero-catch quota. Although NAMMCO doesn't conflict directly with the obligations of membership states under the IWC, it nonetheless presented a challenge to the legitimacy of the IWC.

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