Commercial whaling

Whaling is the hunting of whales for their usable products like meat, oil and blubber. Its earliest forms date to at least circa 3000 BC. Various coastal communities have long histories of subsistence whaling and harvesting beached whales. Industrial whaling emerged with organized fleets in the 17th century; competitive national whaling industries in the 18th and 19th centuries; and the introduction of factory ships along with the concept of whale harvesting in the first half of the 20th century. By the late 1930s, more than 50,000 whales were killed annually In 1986, the International Whaling Commission (IWC) banned commercial whaling because of the extreme depletion of most of the whale stocks.

Contemporary whaling is subject to intense debate. Pro-whaling countries, notably Japan, Norway, and Iceland, wish to lift the ban on certain whale stocks for hunting.Anti-whaling countries and environmental groups oppose lifting the ban.

Whaling began in pre-historic times and was initially confined to (near) coastal waters. Early whaling affected the development of widely disparate cultures – such as Norway and Japan. The Basques were the first to catch whales commercially, and dominated the trade for five centuries, spreading to the far corners of the North Atlantic and even reaching the South Atlantic. Although prehistoric hunting and gathering is generally considered to have had little ecological impact, early whaling in the Arctic may have altered freshwater ecology. The development of modern whaling techniques was spurred in the 19th century by the increase in demand for whale oil, sometimes known as "Train Oil" and in the 20th century by a demand for margarine and later meat.

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