Virgin boss enters marine mammal controversy

February 2014: Virgin Holidays has responded positively to a campaign by Whale and Dolphin Conservation (WDC) asking holiday companies to stop offering trips to see captive whales and dolphins.

Virgin has vowed not to promote any tourist attractions that will take marine animals from the sea. “I’ve instructed Virgin Holidays not to deal with any organisation that does not pledge that they will never again take cetaceans from the sea," says Sir Richard Branson. “We hope other holiday companies will follow suit. Since – I believe – animals bred in captivity cannot safely be released, we will examine what is best to do with this issue, and others, in the engagement process. As part of the process I will personally visit some of these facilities around the world."

Continued

Using whale oil to fuel whale hunting ships is obscene says conservation group

Fin whale made into ‘green biofuel'

February 2013. Whale and Dolphin Conservation (WDC) has reacted strongly to comments given by Iceland's leading whaler in an interview in the Sunday Times newspaper, in which he states that he is using oil from endangered Fin whales as a so-called ‘green biofuel' to power his hunting ships.

Kristjan Loftsson, chief executive of Icelandic whaling company Hvalur, stated in the newspaper interview that his whaling vessels are being fuelled by whale oil (mixed with marine oil), with each boat using roughly the equivalent of the oil from one dead Fin whale for each single day trip it makes.

Absurd, perverse and unethical
Responding to the strange claims that this is a ‘green biofuel', WDC chief executive officer, Chris Butler-Stroud said: "We have known for a while that Icelandic whaling is no longer simply about feeding people. It is driven by the greed of a few individuals determined to try to make enormous amounts of money out of the practice, to the extent that they are even willing to use products from endangered whales to fuel their own ships' engines in order to kill more whales.

Photo:  Iceland's whalers killed 148
Endangered Fin whales in 2010.

"This is a completely absurd, perverse and unethical move by an industry that is already steeped in the blood of whales, and which is now prepared to use the remains of dead whales to keep its own vessels afloat."

Collapse of Japanese market
In 2011, Iceland's total whaling was down from its 2010 peak of 148 Fin whales and 60 Minke whales. The collapse of the Japanese market for Fin whale meat demonstrated the true commercial nature of Iceland's industrial whaling as greatly reduced demand from Japan - a country which prizes Fin whale meat - led to no hunt taking place in 2012.

Continued:  http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/whale-oil013.html

Undercover operation by conservation group reveals whale meat illegally on sale in Denmark Commercial whaling in Greenland -

December 2012. WDC, Whale and Dolphin Conservation has revealed evidence from a recent undercover operation in Denmark which clearly shows whale meat from Greenland on sale commercially in Denmark. 

A WDC team found Minke whale steaks and blubber openly available to buy at a tourist shop in the Danish capital, Copenhagen, thus putting Denmark in breach of European Union (EU) laws which ban EU Member States from the killing and commercial sale of whales. Ironically, the revelations by WDC also come in the week when Greenland has threatened to impose its own quotas regarding the number of whales that it will hunt for ‘local nutritional needs' in 2013.

Contravenes International Whaling Commission regulations
The sale of these whale products in Denmark also contravenes International Whaling Commission (IWC - the body that regulates whaling) regulations, and also those of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES).

Earlier in the year, a separate undercover investigation by WDC revealed that Greenland (a Danish overseas territory) had been actively undermining the IWC ban on commercial whaling by selling whale meat to tourist visiting Greenland from whales that are allowed to be killed only for the nutritional needs of local aboriginal people.

This latest undercover operation by WDC in Denmark itself clearly shows that this form of illegal commercial whaling has now extended into mainland Europe and makes a mockery of Greenland's requests to hunt more whales to feed native Greenlanders.

Continued:  http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/denmark-whales.html