Environmental Change As a Threat to the Pilot Whale Hunt in the Faroe
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Environmental change as a threat to the pilot whale hunt in the Faroe Islandspor_168 430..438 Russell Fielding Department of Geography and Anthropology, Louisiana State University, 227 Howe-Russell-Kniffen Geosciences Complex, Baton Rouge, LA 70803, USA. E-mail rfi[email protected] Keywords Abstract Environment; Faroe Islands; food production; islands; mercury; whaling. The Faroese pilot whale hunt—the grindadráp—has provided meat and blubber for human consumption since at least the late 16th century. This paper briefly Correspondence discusses the history of the grindadráp in the context of its culture and broader Russell Fielding, Department of Geography human–environmental interactions. It then describes threats to the continu- and Anthropology, Louisiana State University, ance of the grindadráp, including the possibility of over-extraction through 227 Howe-Russell-Kniffen Geosciences poor management, international protests and boycotts, and the current issue of Complex, Baton Rouge, LA 70803, USA. E-mail: rfi[email protected] marine pollutants found in the tissues of the whales. Next, it examines the outcomes, or anticipated outcomes, of each of these threats. The coordination doi:10.1111/j.1751-8369.2010.00168.x of science and policy has arguably ensured a sustainable take level, whereas the redirection of many protest efforts to other, more commercialized whaling operations has reduced international pressure on the Faroese to give up whaling. However, the issue of environmental pollutants remains, and has become the leading threat to the grindadráp. It concludes with a look to the future and at what changes the Faroese would have to make in their current food and cultural systems were the grindadráp to cease, and what the environ- mental, economic and cultural effects of those changes might be. The major options examined are: increasing the importation of foodstuffs, increasing local food production and redirecting part of the fisheries’ catch from exports to the local market. Each option carries its own environmental, economic and cul- tural impact. A careful combination of the three will most likely prove to be best, if indeed the grindadráp is to be reduced or abandoned. The meat and blubber of the long-finned pilot whale not subject to the jurisdiction of the International (Globicephala melas) have long been an important part of Whaling Commission (IWC). The IWC regulates the take the diet in the Faroe Islands, a semi-independent archi- of the “great whales” (i.e., all baleen whales and the pelagic nation in the North Atlantic (Fig. 1). Several times sperm whale [Physeter macrocephalus]), but does not regu- each year, large family groups—known as schools or late the take of “small cetaceans” such as pilot whales. pods—of these relatively small, toothed whales are driven IWC member countries regulate their own take or non- ashore in a collective effort by dozens of Faroese boats, take of small cetaceans. and are killed with small hand-held knives when the pod The Faroe Islands are an autonomous province of has become beached on the shore or stranded in shallow Denmark, and were granted home rule in 1948. Since water. The quick exsanguination of dozens of whales that time, the topic of full independence has been dis- turns the harbour waters red: a shocking sight for the cussed within Faroese public and political discourse uninitiated observer. After the kill, local authorities dis- (Ackrén 2006). Denmark supplies the Faroes with an tribute the meat and blubber free of charge among the annual subsidy, police and military forces, and handles hunt’s participants, and then among the residents of the some international representation, though the Faroese district in which the landing took place. Home Rule government handles most domestic affairs, This activity—known in Faroese as the grindadráp—is including regulation of the grindadráp, and an increasing governed by strict regulations under Faroese law and is number of foreign affairs. The Danish delegation to the 430 Polar Research 29 2010 430–438 © 2010 the author, journal compilation © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd Environmental change and the Faroese pilot whale hunt whaling industry in the mid-20th century (Dickinson & Sanger 2005). Another force is protest and boycott, in the form of anti-whaling organizations successfully lobbying other nations, corporations or individuals to stop trade with the Faroes unless they cease whaling activities, thus decreas- ing the market for Faroese fish, which is by far the main export of the islands. In this scenario, the Faroese would voluntarily give up whaling (a non-commercial activity) in order to save their fisheries (their leading source of income) from international boycott. The peak of the protest against Faroese whaling occurred during the 1980s and 1990s, and was well documented by Sander- son (1990, 1994) who was a key player in the discourse, owing to her role with the Faroese Office of the Prime Minister, which required her to provide official answers to many of the protest letters written to the Faroese Fig. 1 Map of the Faroe Islands showing its location between Iceland, government. Norway and Scotland. Map by C. Duplechin, Louisiana State University. A third challenge to whaling in the Faroes is pollution in the form of methyl-mercury (MeHg) and other toxins that accumulate in the tissues of the pilot whales and IWC is made up of representatives from Denmark and cause adverse health effects in consumers. This threat is the Faroes, as well as representatives from Greenland, the subject of ongoing research by Faroese scientists and which has also been granted home rule by the Danish researchers from abroad. Leading the research efforts are government. two medical doctors, Philippe Grandjean of the Harvard School of Public Health and the University of Southern Denmark’s Institute of Public Health, and Pál Weihe, Challenges chief physician in the Department of Occupational and Grindadráp have occurred throughout the Norse history Public Health in the Faroese Hospital System. If this of the Faroes, with written descriptions from as early as threat were to lead to the termination of whaling in the 1632 (Sanderson 1992), locally-kept statistical records Faroe Islands it would be the result of a government from 1584 (van Ginkel 2005), and archaeological evi- ruling or recommendation in the interest of public dence for the presence of pilot whales in the early Faroese health, and would most likely originate from the office diet dating to the “Viking Age” (Sanderson 1992), which of Dr Weihe. is generally defined in the Faroes as lasting from AD 800 In recent decades, each of these scenarios has taken its to AD 1035 (Edwards 2005). Throughout the history of turn as the leading threat to the continuance of the grind- the Faroe Islands, various cultural and environmental adráp, at least in the realm of public perception. I will forces have challenged the continuation of the grindadráp. discuss below each threat as well as its likely outcome. Of these, three have dominated academic discourse about the persistence of whaling in modern societies in recent Over-extraction decades. One is over-extraction, that is, the possibility that The Faroese take on average 900–1000 pilot whales each whaling takes place at an unsustainable level, exhausting year, although there is much variance from this mean. In the stocks of pilot whales or decreasing their genetic some years—notably around WWII—many more whales diversity to the point that they are no longer able to than average were taken; in other years—most recently, maintain a viable population. In this scenario, Faroese 2008—no whales were taken at all (Statistics Faroe whaling would cease simply because there would not be Islands 2008). enough whales to make the activity worthwhile, or the Over-extraction has the potential to become a threat to activity would become illegal (either by Faroese law or any wild animal harvest. Without good management to international treaty) before the stocks got too low in keep technological advances and human population order to facilitate a revival of the pilot whale population. increases in check, there is the potential for the hunters Over-extraction in the Faroes would echo the situation or fishermen to simply catch too many of their prey, that Newfoundland experienced with its own pilot reducing the population to a point from which it cannot Polar Research 29 2010 430–438 © 2010 the author, journal compilation © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd 431 Environmental change and the Faroese pilot whale hunt return. When this happens the species, at least as a detailed chronology here, beginning in 1981 when the resource, is extinct. activity was “discovered” by international environmental We can compare the grindadráp to a similar North organizations. Atlantic pilot whale drive that occurred in Newfoundland • 1981. Greenpeace representatives visit the Faroes to during the 20th century (Dickinson & Sanger 2005; Field- document the (now ceased) fin whale (Balaenoptera ing 2007a). Newspapers from the mid-1800s in physalus) catch. Their visit coincides with three large Newfoundland archives show that the occasional pilot grindadráp. The representatives’ final report to Green- whale drive was an important source of supplemental peace (Glover 1981) focuses primarily (and critically) income for residents of the island’s south-eastern penin- upon the grindadráp. sula, who earned a share of the proceeds from producing • 1984. A Danish television company produces a docu- and selling whale oil (Cranford & Hillier 1995). In 1951 mentary film about the grindadráp that increased its the Newfoundland pilot whale drive was organized visibility within Europe. commercially, and 3100 whales were taken that year. • 1985. At the annual meeting of the IWC in Whaling records in Newfoundland show that landings Bournemouth, UK, the topic of the grindadráp is increased with the demand for oil and meat, to a peak of brought up, although the IWC maintains its stance that 9794 in 1956 (Pinhorn 1976).