Yahoo News 5 Jan 11;
TOKYO (AFP) – Japan's whale meat stocks likely hit a record level of more than 6,000 tons last year, conservationists were quoted saying in a report Wednesday, suggesting it is becoming less popular with consumers.
The Iruka & Kujira (Dolphin & Whale) Action Network and journalist Junko Sakuma estimate that the stockpile could have reached 6,025 tons, higher than the previous record of 5,969 tons set in April 2006, Kyodo News said.
The data, if true, might reflect falling demand for whale meat, which is sourced from Japan's controversial government-run whaling programmes in waters near Japan and the Antarctic, Kyodo said.
The news agency said that "the finding will likely heighten calls for Tokyo to review its research whaling programme as it is financed partly by revenues from sales of the meat as well as state subsidies".
Anti-whaling nations, led by Australia and New Zealand, and environmental groups such as Greenpeace and Sea Shepherd have long criticised Japan for its whale hunts, criticising them as cruel and unnecessary.
Japan kills hundreds of whales a year under a loophole in the 1986 moratorium on commercial whaling that allows "lethal research".
The fisheries agency has said Japan's whale meat stockpile in August was estimated at 5,790 tons -- but the activists challenge the figure, saying it is based on a smaller sample of warehouses than previous surveys.
Kyodo said the whale meat stocks seemed to have increased as consumption fell more sharply than supply, which has also has been decreasing as Sea Shepherd activists have obstructed harpoon ships in recent years.
"Although the supply has been small and wholesale prices of whale meat have been cut in the past two years, the pace of decline in stocks has been slowing as Japanese people are moving away from whale meat," Sakuma told Kyodo.
Because the fisheries agency's survey method changed in 2010, an agency official said he could not compare the latest data with past figures, declining to confirm whether the stockpile last summer hit a record high.
"The available amount of whale meat tends to increase in the summer," when coastal whaling ships return from the northwestern Pacific, the official added.
