the economics of Japanese whaling

Official government of Japan statistics, Japanese press clippings, and public opinion polling in Japan show conclusively that the claim that Japanese commercial whaling is a cultural and nutritional necessity is a lie. Commercial whaling in Japan is an industry that is not profitable, that is able to exist only because of taxpayer subsidies, and that provides a product catering increasingly to a shrinking and ageing market.

Introduction

In early 2012, the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) commissioned the Japanese firm ESquare to look at official government of Japan figures on that country's whaling industry, including whale meat sales and stockpiles, taxpayer subsidies paid to keep the whaling fleet afloat, and money spent on that country’s vote in the International Whaling Commission (IWC). We also commissioned the Nippon Research Center to conduct polling on Japanese public attitudes towards whaling, taxpayer subsidies, and the consumption of whale meat. 

For years, IFAW and other organizations have been campaigning against commercial whaling. Our opposition has many different aspects, including the fact that commercial whaling is cruel and that, without exception, it has depleted every single whale population that it has targeted throughout its history.

The pro-whaling argument is increasingly true

There have been other elements to our argument: the consistency with which the whaling industry obfuscates and lies—for example, historically often killing more whales than it has admitted to catching, or, more recently, wrapping its whaling in a transparent veneer of “science.” Over the past decade or so, however, it has become more and more apparent that the very foundation of the pro-whaling argument within Japan—that whaling is a cultural and nutritional necessity—is profoundly and increasingly untrue. In fact, all the evidence we have seen strongly suggests that the opposite is the case, that whaling is an unprofitable business that can survive only with substantial subsidies and one that caters to an increasingly shrinking and ageing market.

ifaw conducts public opinion research on commercial whaling in Japan

To establish the veracity of that view, IFAW worked within Japan, employing Japanese companies including E-Square and the Nippon Research Center to dig into official figures and to elicit the opinions of the Japanese public. This report is based heavily on a larger report that E-Square researched and wrote, as well as on the results of Nippon Research Center public opinion polling, conducted in October 2012. 

To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time that official government of Japan statistics on whaling have been compiled and made available to a global audience. They present a very different picture to the one painted by officials in Tokyo.

The economics of whaling are no longer salient in the eyes of the public

They show that whaling is dying in the hearts, minds, stomachs, wallets, and marketplaces of Japan. It turns out that demand for whale meat was largely a post-war blip in that country. With growing wealth and modernization, the good people of Japan have lost their yen for whale meat. Yet fisheries officials and other government figures continue to siphon off millions of taxpayer yen to prop up an industry that is effectively dead in the water.

The alternative to whaling: whale watching

There is one whale-based industry in Japan that is profitable and has tremendous scope for growth. That industry is whale watching. However, whale watching does not receive the massive government subsidies that are funneled to whaling. If the government of Japan genuinely wants to generate income and benefit coastal communities, it should support whale watching, not whale hunting. Whales are not only better off alive than dead; they are more valuable that way. Animals, people, and coastal economies all do better when whales are seen and not hurt.

Read the full report