page_title: International Whaling Commission
section_title: IWC membership
hierarchical_section_title: International Whaling Commission / Politics / IWC membership
context_page_description: The International Whaling Commission is an international body set up by the terms of the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling, which was signed in Washington, D.C., United States, on 2 December 1946 to "provide for the proper conservation of whale stocks and thus make possible the orderly development of the whaling industry".
  In 1982 the IWC adopted a moratorium on commercial whaling. Currently, Japan, Canada, and a number of other nations oppose this moratorium. The IWC allows non-zero whaling quotas for aboriginal subsistence and also member nations may issue 'Scientific Permits' to their citizens. Japan has issued such permits since 1986, Norway and Iceland whale under objection to the moratorium and issue their own quotas. In 1994, the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary was created by the IWC.
  The main duty of the IWC is to keep under review and revise as necessary the measures laid down in the Schedule to the Convention which govern the conduct of whaling throughout the world.
context_section_description: The purpose of the IWC as specified in its constitution is "in safeguarding for future generations the great natural resources represented by the whale stocks;" and the original members consisted only of the 15 whale-hunting nations. However, since the late 1970s and early 1980s, many countries which have no previous history of whaling (some of which are landlocked such as Switzerland and Mongolia) have joined the IWC. This shift was first initiated by Sir Peter Scott, the then head of the World Wildlife Fund. Labelling the IWC a "butchers' club", he mounted lobbying campaigns in developed countries with support from the green lobby and anti-whaling block of IWC members to change the composition of the IWC's membership, which was instrumental in obtaining the necessary three-quarters majority vote to implement the moratorium on commercial whaling in 1986. This campaign triggered the first accusations of vote-buying in IWC. According to Scott's biographer, Elspeth Huxley, China's decision to join was influenced by a World Wildlife Fund promise to provide $1 million to fund a panda reserve. Michael Tillman, former IWC Commissioner of the United States, said in a radio interview that "there was what we called 'common knowledge,' that a number of countries joined and that their dues and the travel support was reportedly due to conservation groups providing it. So that, in a sense, one could say that the conservation groups set out a strategy that the Japanese copied." 
  Since the moratorium was adopted, the support for it has dropped from a 75% majority to a 50-50 split, with many of the countries initially recruited by the anti-whaling side now voting with the pro-whaling block. (A 75% majority is needed to overturn the moratorium.) Anti-whaling campaign groups and some governments claim that the Japanese Fisheries Agency has carried out a programme of "vote-buying" - i.e. offering aid to poorer countries in return for them joining the IWC and supporting Japanese positions on whaling. Japan claims, however, that this accusation itself is politically motivated because Japan's overseas aid is not only given to pro-whaling countries. Japan has given US$320 million in overseas aid to Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, Guinea, Morocco, Panama, St. Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, St Kitts and Nevis and the Solomon Islands. Caribbean countries have consistently sided with Japan in each IWC vote since 2001 though the Caribbean nations admit the rules may possibly impact on their fishing activities as well. Pacific countries' voting patterns vary even for each motion, as they are lobbied by neighbouring pro-whaling Japan and anti-whaling New Zealand and Australia. Greenpeace alleges that Japan's aid activities and these countries' voting patterns are correlated. These allegations of tying aid to votes are based on public admissions by government officials both inside and outside Japan, as well as an analysis of voting patterns compared to Japanese Fisheries Aid received.
  In 2005, The Environmental Investigation Agency approached Lord Ashcroft of the UK to use his influence in Belize to assure support for the anti-whaling camp. It was reported that Ashcroft paid Belize's IWC subscription fees:
  "Every month I'm on the water somewhere," he says. "I've grown a close affinity, not just for whales, but for dolphins and porpoises. So it wasn't difficult for me to approach the Belizean authorities with such a brief." He discovered that Belize's annual subscription to the IWC — £10,000 — had lapsed and came up with the cash. That backing yielded swift results when a crucial vote was won by the anti-whaling nations by a majority of one.
  Both sides accuse each other of using underhanded tactics to pack the commission with countries sympathetic to their position. Edwin Snagg, the IWC commissioner for St Vincent and the Grenadines stated, "It's a question of respect,....Because you are small and because you are underdeveloped there is this view and there is this feeling that you can easily be bought and you can easily be sold. We in
caption: Japanese whaling since 1985. The catch in '85, '86, and about half of '87 were "under objection"; the rest are "scientific permit".