Korea plans to conduct scientific research of whales through non-lethal methods, government officials said Tuesday.
“After gathering opinions from various sides, the government is now in the process of finalizing its plan to study whales through non-lethal techniques, like many other countries such as Australia do,” an official at the Ministry for Food, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries said.
The government had initially sought to lift an all-out ban on whaling, which has been in place since 1986, to allow the study and had notified the International Whaling Commission in July of its plan.
The move, however, sparked strong protests from anti-whaling countries as well as domestic conservation groups, and the government decided to keep the ban on whale hunting and seek non-lethal methods.
Fishermen in Ulsan, a city with a long-running whaling tradition, have been demanding the government to ease the ban, claiming that the marine mammals are depleting fish stocks.
Whale meat remains popular in the city and some other coastal towns of Korea with whales accidentally caught in nets remaining the only legal source of such meat.
By Lee Sun-young (
milaya@heraldcorp.com)
