Pippa Middleton admits eating whale meat in newspaper column

Pippa Middleton has recieved criticism from conservationists across the world for eating whale meat on a trip to Norway, which she recounted in her column for the Daily Telegraph.

In the piece she said: ”We dined on smoked whale carpaccio (which tastes similar to smoked salmon but looks more like venison carpaccio).”

Despite strong international pressure and commercial whaling being banned since 1986 Norway is still one of three countries (the other two are Japan, and Iceland) that still allows whaling and in 2014 had a record year when more than 700 were killed.

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Norwegian minister pledges to push whale meat sales in Japan

Posted by: Leya Musa / 2 days ago

Elisabeth Aspaker, Norway’s fisheries minister, has said that she will push for greater sales of whale meat caught by Norwegian whalers into Japan’s markets. She made the promise in an interview on Norway’s NRK TV channel. This is despite Japan having stockpiles of whale meat that people do not want to buy.

The minister said, “We have Japan as a potential export country. We must see if we can work been harder promote it.”

The commitment was made after a documentary was shown on the weekend that claimed that whaling in Norway would disappear in 10 or 15 years if current trends continue.

The documentary looked at the history of a whaling family and highlighted how the whaling fleet of Norway consisted of 350 ships in the 1950′s but today only has 23 ships left today.

The journalist, Frank A. Jenssen, who has written extensively on whaling in Norway said, “In about ten to 15 years, there may be no whalers left in Norway , and it would be a tragedy.”

Read on

Whale meat illegally sold at German food fair

January 2014: Whale and Dolphin Conservation (WDC) has revealed that food products claiming to contain Norwegian minke whale meat have been sold illegally at one of the world’s biggest food and agricultural fairs - Berlin Green Week.

Following a tip off, the WDC, together with marine protection organization MEER eV, discovered that the dish, which purportedly contains smoked whale meat with blueberry jam,was being offered for sale.

WDC has brought the sale of the meat to the attention of the German Federal Environment Ministry who have confirmed that they will be investigating further. The import and sale of whale and dolphin meat to Germany and elsewhere in the EU is strictly prohibited."The fact that the meat of a species which is strictly protected in Germany, and the EU, is offered for sale is scandalous,” says Astrid Fuchs, campaign manager at WDC.“This underlines the fact that there is an urgent need for a greater application of existing laws. Not only has Norway broken the law here several times – by importation and sale – but the unsuspecting visitors to the fair will also be breaking existing laws by purchasing the meat. It is incredible that this is going on under the noses of the authorities at such a big, international exhibition."

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Whale meat ingredient for new beer

January 2014: The news that the Icelandic brewery is going to produce a beer that includes dead whales as one of its ingredients has dismayed conservationists across the globe. ‘Whale beer’ is the brainchild of the Icelandic Steðjar brewery and fin whaling company, Hvalur, and its launch is timed to coincide with the Icelandic mid-winter festival of Þorrablót (Thorrablot) held in honour of the Norse god, Thor.

Brewery owner, Dabjartur Arilíusson, said: "This is a unique beer, brewed in collaboration with Hvalur hf. Whale beer will include, among other things, whale meal.” 

“Sadly, WDC has become increasingly used to Hvalur’s desperate hunts for new outlets for his whale meat,” says Vanessa Williams-Grey, WDC’s Icelandic whaling campaign lead. “Demand for this meat is in decline with fewer and fewer people eating it. Even so, reducing a beautiful, sentient whale to an ingredient on the side of a beer bottle is about as immoral and outrageous as it is possible to get. The brewery may claim that this is just a novelty product with a short shelf life, but what price the life of an endangered whale which might have lived to be 90 years?"

http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/whale-meat-beer.html

Dangers of mercury in whale meat highlighted by new treaty

New mercury treaty to flag threats to human health of toxic whale & dolphin meat

October 2013. As the world's first legally binding international treaty to curb the release of mercury into the environment has been signed, a coalition of NGOs urged countries to take immediate steps to address communities at particular risk of contamination from the consumption of whale and dolphin products.

Mercury contaminated meat

"For far too long, coastal communities around the world have been allowed to consume the mercury-contaminated meat of whales, dolphins and porpoises, many in ignorance of the risks involved," said Clare Perry, Senior Campaigner at the UK-and US-based Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA).

"Now signatories to the new treaty must make communities in places as far afield as Japan and the Faroe Islands properly aware of the very serious risks to human health that come from eating the meat of toothed cetaceans."

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Iceland is Cashing in on Endangered Whale Meat (Op-Ed)

Leigh Henry is senior policy adviser for species conservation and advocacy at World Wildlife Fund (WWF). She contributed this article to LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.

Two years ago, I visited Laguna San Ignacio in Baja California, Mexico — a magical place that is home to the gray whale, one of Earth's largest mammals. Most of my time on the water during that excursion was spent with a gray whale mother and her calf. They approached the boat several times, granting me one of the most amazing wildlife encounters of my life.

Meanwhile, far away in the waters of the northern Atlantic, whales are not receiving such a welcome reception. Commercial whaling vessels are hunting endangered fin whales for their meat at an alarming rate — despite a global ban by the International Whaling Commission. Hvalur, the Icelandic commercial whaling company, recently resumed its commercial hunt of endangered fin whales after a two-year hiatus. Between June 1 and Aug. 19 of this year, 100 fin whales have been slaughtered. Hvalur has exported thousands of tons of whale meat annually to Japan, and John Vidal, reporting for the Guardian, found that Hvalur killed 148 endangered fin whales to feed that trade in 2010 alone.

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Iceland whale meat returned to Iceland

Shipping lines and ports refusing to carry Iceland's whale meat

July 2013. Mr Loftsson, the lone, obstinate Fin whaler in Iceland, seems to be in trouble.

For years the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) has been asking "what's the point?" of his whaling operation. Besides being cruel, his whaling has never looked profitable. His only possible market, Japan, has never been particularly inviting and now he's having trouble finding anyone who will carry the products of his cruel trade.

Whaler meat found in Rotterdam Harbour

Mr Loftsson's most recent troubles began at the beginning of July when whale meat was discovered in a merchant vessel in Rotterdam harbour. It was labelled as "fish", but the six containers were estimated to contain the meat of between five and six Fin whales. After a huge on-line Avaaz campaign deluged a million emails on the port authorities, they announced that no further whale meat would be allowed into their port as such a trade was in breach of their corporate responsibility policies.

Attention then turned to the exporter, Samskip. Within days they issued a statement saying they would not carry the six containers to Japan and that", for the sake of avoiding any misunderstanding, Samskip confirms that it does not plan to ship whale meat in the future."

Containers returned to Iceland

Mr Loftsson then had to sit and accept that his six containers of whale meat were put back on a ship to Reykjavik. As if that wasn't enough, he then had to watch his cargo televised on national TV being received into Reykjavik harbour by a welcoming flotilla organised by IFAW and Icewhale - the Icelandic Federation of Whale Watchers. They held up a huge pointing finger beside their banner which read "what's the point of whaling?"

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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

Undercover investigation reveals whales killed for ‘local needs’ in Greenland are being served to tourists

Real reasons behind Denmark's pleas to increase the number of whales it needs to kill for native Greenlandic peoples are exposed 
June 2012. Despite a ban on commercial whaling, an undercover investigation by the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society (WDCS) has revealed that Greenland (a Danish overseas territory) has been actively undermining the International Whaling Commission (IWC) ban on commercial whaling by selling whale meat, from whales it is allowed to kill solely for the nutritional needs of local aboriginal people, to tourists visiting the country.

WDCS investigators visiting Greenland documented restaurants and hotels deliberately targeting tourists by placing bowhead and other whale meat on their menus. The investigations also revealed supermarkets openly selling endangered fin whale and other whale meats, all freely available for visitors to the country to buy.

Denmark to request increase in whaling for ‘subsistence'
These revelations come on the eve of the annual meeting of the International Whaling Commission (the international body that regulates whaling) in Panama in July, where Denmark is set to ask that it be allowed to kill more whales in future years to meet the nutritional subsistence needs of the native population in Greenland. 

‘Purpose of local aboriginal consumption'
However, the IWC requires that subsistence whaling should be for the ‘purposes of local aboriginal consumption', not for the type of commercial sale that the investigation by WDCS has revealed.

Read on:  http://www.wildlifeextra.com/go/news/greenland-iwc.html#cr

Do not bring whale meat home from Iceland, British tourists told

Whale meat on sale at Keflavik airport prompts the Foreign Office to issue a warning to Britons at risk of breaching international law

Up to 70,000 Britons who visit Iceland each year have been given a stiff warning by the Foreign Office not to bring home any whale meat, saying to do so is in breach of international law protecting endangered species.

Penalties of imprisonment or fines up to £5,000 could be meted out by the courts, says the Foreign Office, because importation into Britain and other EU countries is illegal under the Convention on International Trade of Endangered Species (Cites).

The government has added the warning to its advice on travelling to Iceland after being alerted to the fact that whale meat is on sale at Keflavik airport. Environment department Defra, responsible for border checks on illegal food imports, said: "There have been no reports of whale meat on sale in the UK or being seized at the border."

Icelandic whalers are trying to win tourists over to their point of view, offering them the chance to go to see [sic] with them, feel harpoons and eat whale meat and blubber.

http://www.u.tv/News/Do-not-bring-whale-meat-home-from-Iceland-British-tourists-told/6abae12e-98ed-4a64-bb66-489db2786f9b