TROUBLED WATERS - Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society

humanitarian purposes the time taken to inflict death must be regarded as the significant factor”. Theworking party considered and discounted the possibility of developing quicker and surer methods ofkilling whales involving drugs, carbon-dioxide gas and electricity, but agreed that a combination ofexplosive harpoon and electricity “might provide a speedier method of killing.” (IWC 1961).Welfare and the ICRWAlthough some IWC members still argue that the ICRW does not provide the IWC with a directmandate to address humane killing, the Convention grants the Commission competence to makebinding regulations that are “based on scientific findings”. The text states: “The Commission mayamend from time to time the provisions of the Schedule by adopting regulations with respect to theconservation and utilisation of whale resources, fixing… (e) time, methods, and intensity of whaling… (f)types and specifications of gear and appliances which may be used” (ICRW, Article V, 1946). Moreover,Article VI states that the commission may “make recommendations to any or all contractinggovernments on any matters which relate to whales or whaling.”These articles have subsequently provided IWC members concerned about the welfare of huntedwhales with a means to try to prohibit the use of certain killing methods. Despite this, little wasachieved before 1980 that directly improved the humaneness of whaling operations because the rulesgoverning the killing of whales were focussed on improving efficiency and reducing wastage ratherthan improving animal welfare. Although serious questions regarding the cruelty involved in whalingwere put to the IWC as early as the 1950s, it took 30 years before the ‘cold’ or non-explosiveharpoon was finally banned for all species by the 1982/83 season 3 (Table 1).Welfare and the moratoriumIn 1972, international concern over the plight of the whales was raised at the UN Conference on theEnvironment, held in Stockholm. It called for an immediate ten-year moratorium on whaling andthe ‘strengthening’ of the IWC, which was, at that time, dominated by whaling interests. By 1982,many countries had heeded the UN’s call a decade earlier and had joined the IWC to support amoratorium on commercial whaling. Many of these cited the cruelty of whaling as a reason for theirdecision.THE IWC AND WHALE WELFARE31Rather than introduce a moratorium, the IWC responded to the UN by adopting the ‘NewManagement Procedure’ (NMP) in 1975, to regulate the industry. However, the NMP did notinclude any new welfare provisions. The previous year, the IWC Scientific Committee considered apaper by Peter Best of South Africa on ‘Death Times for Whales killed by Explosive Harpoons’ (Best1974). He argued that it was unlikely to be possible to reduce times to death by any other devicethan the explosive harpoon because of “....the practical difficulties associated with consistently scoring alethal hit on an unrestrained target from a moving platform.” The Scientific Committee recommendedthat the commission seek advice from experts to “examine ways of improving the efficiency of existingmethods” (IWC 1975a).The following year there had been little progress, but significantly, the Scientific Committeerecommended that: “criteria should be established for judging the humaneness of killing” and that “....therapidity with which the whale is rendered unconscious and killed is the most important factor, both fromthe humane and commercial point of view” (IWC 1975b). In 1977, a proposal that the number ofharpoons used to kill whales should be reported was not adopted by the Commission (IWC 1977).