While the rest of the world is trying to protect whale populations, decimated by the rampant hunting carried out in the twentieth century, Japan, Norway and Iceland continue to kill hundreds of cetaceans every year for commercial purposes. After initially respecting the moratorium issued in 1986 by the International Whaling Commission (IWC), which bans whale hunting, Iceland in 2006 granted the country's whaling industry permission to hunt two species: the fin whale (Balaenoptera physalus), classified as "vulnerable" on the IUCN Red List, and the minke whale (Balaenoptera acutorostrata).

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Each year, Icelandic whalers are permitted to kill, using explosive harpoons, up to 229 minke whales and 154 fin whales. This year, however, not a single whale will be hunted in Icelandic waters — and perhaps not in the future either — offering a glimpse of the end of this anachronistic industry.

A new beginning for Icelandic whales

Iceland has in fact announced that every hunting expedition has been cancelled. The country's leading whaling company, Hvalur, has said it will not go whale hunting for the second consecutive year, while Ip Utgerd, the main operator responsible for catching minke whales in Iceland, announced on 24 April that it will permanently cease its operations.

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Why Iceland is giving up whale hunting

Companies — particularly those whose profits are based on killing sentient beings — do not make decisions on ethical grounds, but on economic calculations. This case is no exception. Gunnar Jonsson, chief executive of Ip Utgerd, has stated that hunting whales in Icelandic waters is no longer economically viable. Due to the extension of the coastal zone in which fishing is prohibited, the boats "would have had to go further out to sea to hunt the whales, making operations too costly," Jonsson said, adding that the company will focus on fishing for sea cucumbers.

Hvalur similarly explained that it will not go hunting this year due to fierce competition from Japan, whose whale products receive government subsidies, problems related to the export of whale meat, and, to a lesser extent, restrictions linked to coronavirus. Exporting to Japan, the main market for Icelandic fin whale meat (which is not eaten by Icelandic citizens), is becoming increasingly difficult owing to stricter food safety requirements imposed by Japan on imported meat. Whales are particularly vulnerable to environmental contaminants; their meat is therefore unsafe for human consumption and requires thorough testing.

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Time to hang up the harpoons

"It's fantastic news," said Rob Read, director of Sea Shepherd UK, a group that documented whale hunting operations in Iceland in 2018. "Now the time has come for Hvalur too to hang up its harpoons for good and for Iceland to become a whale-watching nation, not a whale-killing one."

A wind of change

It has been just over a year since the Icelandic Minister of Fisheries declared that Iceland would kill 2,130 whales over the next five years. Today, partly due to intense international condemnation, whale hunting may have come to a permanent end. Credit for this sudden reversal also belongs to Icelandic citizens themselves, who have virtually stopped consuming whale meat and are increasingly opposed to this activity. Only 3 per cent of Icelanders, according to a survey conducted a few years ago, said they regularly eat whale meat.

Iceland, like Japan, has discovered that whales can be more profitable alive than dead. Whale watching is in fact one of the country's leading tourist attractions and generates over eleven million euros a year, drawing more than 200,000 tourists annually. In Iceland's icy waters it is possible to spot over twenty species of cetaceans, such as humpback whales, minke whales, sperm whales and orcas, making it one of the best places in Europe to watch whales throughout the year. For this year, and perhaps for years to come, Iceland's whales — already threatened by climate change and the depletion of the seas caused by industrial fishing — will be able, at the very least, to swim without fear of being hunted.