Whale meat on the menu for school lunches?
The Herald this morning ran the disturbing story that a Japanese company is seeking to distribute whale meat from ’scientific’ whale hunts to Japanese schools, hospitals and family-oriented restaurants in order to ‘whet the appetite’ of Japanese consumers for whale meat. This follows previous stories pointing out that whale meat often languishes in stockpiles in Japan and may even be used for dog food.
Clearly, as Metiria pointed out in her release on the issue, there is no market for whale meat in Japan. If people don’t want to eat it, it shouldn’t be foisted on them. This is nothing but a cynical attempt to drum up demand in order to justify lifting the IWC moratorium.
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May 11th, 2006 at 4:46 pm
It surprised me talking to a WSPC member from Japan the other day that there is actually little demand in Japan for whale meat. Here it is again. Anyone perhaps have any insights as to whose interests are being served by the whaling continuing? Surely the whalers can’t have so much influence on their own?
May 12th, 2006 at 1:58 am
the new whale-meat market ing company mentioned in the Herald article simply reflects desperation on the part of the quasi-governmental agency that runs the whaling programme.
they have doubled their slaughter but have nowhere to put it except into huge cold storage warehouses. existing restaurant, hotel and retail demand is tiny and cannot possibly absorb the volumes they are taking.
this is in fact just reverting to the tactics used by the industry in the 1960s and 1970s to off-load subsidised whale meat onto “captive markets”–school lunch caterers and hospital kitchens. the recipients don’t get the chance to refuse, except by leaving it on their plate.
the only new aspect seems to be a push to sell directly to the huge fami-res chains at cut-down prices to stimulate demand in other channels. whale meat is already often seen in conveyer-belt sushi restaurants and at ordinary suburban supermarkets, but the demand is miniscule.
it is not a delicacy, but it does possess “rareness” value for some people, who might eat it to show off to their friends how they can eat a “wierd” food.
a lot of Japanese who grew up in the 1960s have awful memories of being forced to eat whale in their catered school meals, and just now gag at the thought of it now.
there are maybe a dozen or so coastal villages in the whole of Japan that have traditions of whale eating going back centuries. the rest of this is just a chauvinisitc nationalist obsession by the powerful right wing.
the only reason a lot of people here support whaling is because they think Japan is being bullied by western countries. Japanese love to see themselves as the poor victim. Even when they invade, occupy and enslave all their neighbouring countries, the only important thing to remember is poor Japan being the VICTIM of the world’s only atomic bombings. the last thing i would do is say hiroshima and nagasaki were justified. they weren’t. but the analogy is useful.
May 15th, 2006 at 11:56 am
Metiria’s press release on this issue has been linked to by fark.com.