About 320 tons of fin whale meat were unloaded at Sendai port in Miyagi Prefecture on Monday, with some 1.6 tons set to be transported to six markets across the country including Tokyo and Osaka as raw meat.

  • Flemmy@lemm.ee
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    9 days ago

    Black market whale oil, for medicine or whatever. I think whale hunting traditions is far outdated imo. But don’t touch local traditions of whale killing or else you’ll get a bottle at your head. Fishers are sometimes lowkey pirates.

    • HellsBelle@sh.itjust.works
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      9 days ago

      There are traditional cultures that hunt whales, like Inuit people. But they take one whale, not 25.

      Japan is not hunting in a traditional way nor holding to what their ancestors did.

      • Scott_of_the_Arctic@lemmy.world
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        8 days ago

        In fairness some of the traditional methods are pretty inhumane. In the Faroes for example they herd them onto the beach which is not great, whereas in Norway they shoot it in the head with an exploding harpoon which is much quicker.

        • HellsBelle@sh.itjust.works
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          8 days ago

          That’s fair. But Japan is harvesting fin whales that are second in size to the blue whale. Those whales are facing a huge proplem with overhunting.

          The Faroes hunt is for pilot whales and dolphins which are not facing as an extreme population degradation.