Sir

Frank Cipriano and Stephen Palumbi, in their Scientific Correspondence “Genetic tracking of a protected whale” (Nature 397, 307–308; 1999), should have stuck to scientific arguments and left the anti-whaling propaganda to non-scientific publications [see their reply below]. The hybrid blue/fin whale they examined is not “protected” as they claimed: this word cannot be applied to whales taken under permit for research or under an aboriginal exemption, but only to whales protected from commercial whaling.

Taking any species for scientific research is not a loophole to the protection of whales afforded by the commercial whaling moratorium; it is a right and an obligation applied to all International Whaling Commission (IWC) members by article VIII of the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling.

IWC resolutions for the genetic testing of whale meat have no legal basis for implementation by IWC. Nevertheless, as Cipriano and Palumbi point out, Norway has already begun to develop a genetic database for minke whales taken by its whalers. Japan is developing a genetic database for all marine mammals landed in the country, whether from small cetacean catches, strandings, or as a result of research.

Cipriano and Palumbi's statement “Thus #26 was killed despite a global moratorium on commercial whaling, and evaded a strict system for the international traffic in protected species⃛” is provocative, given that this killing, as all agree, was legal. Japan does not permit the import of whale meat from countries that are not IWC members. Iceland resigned from the IWC and is no longer eligible to export whale products to Japan. Norway has prohibited exports of whale meat products.

Cipriano and Palumbi also strayed into propaganda with their statement that “more than 1,000 minke whales are killed each year by IWC members⃛ despite the moratorium”. But the moratorium does not apply to whales taken under scientific permit; nor to IWC members that filed objections to it (Norway); nor to whales allocated by the IWC for aboriginal whaling (Greenland, US and Russian Inuits, and so on). The authors also did not mention that 1,000 minkes annually are hardly a statistical blip in a population of more than one million. And they did not explain why they concluded that a “genetic monitoring programme is necessary” because 1,000 minke whales were taken legally.

Finally, Cipriano and Palumbi are wrong to characterize legal rights and obligations as “loopholes⃛ large enough for protected whales to slip through”. The catch and identification of a blue/fin hybrid whale advanced scientific knowledge of a species interaction that most scientists had not thought possible. Similarly, the Japanese discovery of a pygmy minke whale species and its minke stock identifications in the Antarctic were significant contributions to science. Would Cipriano and Palumbi ban this type of science to close their “loophole”?

As for the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), more countries would support it if it were more scientifically based and less driven by animal-rights lobbyists. That is why most countries are now trying to reform it.