Commercial whaling for the first time in 31 years The mother ship returns to the port Yamaguchi Shimonoseki October 4, 14:18
The fleet's mother ship, which had resumed commercial whaling for the first time in 31 years, returned to the port in Shimonoseki City, Yamaguchi Prefecture on the 4th. There was no sabotage from anti-whaling groups, and we were able to catch as many whales as the upper limit.
The commercial whaling resumed in July, and Shimonoseki City is the only offshore operation base in the country. Of the whaling fleet that has been operating for three months, the mother ship Nisshin Maru is on the 4th. I arrived at the port in the morning.
The whaling fleet operates in Japan's territorial waters on the Pacific side and in the EEZ = exclusive economic zone, and this time, the Bryde's whales were 187 and the sardine whales were 25, while the minke whales It means that 11 caps and the upper limit will not be reached, and the total amount of meat will be about 1430 tons.
During the operation, there were no obstructions from overseas anti-whaling organizations.
The whaling fleet is scheduled to start operation again off the coast in March next year for less than a month.
Eiji Mori, president of the “joint ship” that operates the fleet, said, “I thought I wouldn't talk if I couldn't get a whale anyway, but I worked very hard. I would like to verify this operation and connect it next year.” It was.
“A smooth start” Nozoto Eto
Regarding the fact that the whaling fleet that finished commercial whaling for the first time in 31 years returned to the port of Shimonoseki city on the 4th and finished the whaling of the past, Minister Eto, Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries at a press conference after the cabinet meeting on the 4th, “It's good to have started well with almost all of the quotas that have been set for commercial whaling,” he said.
On top of that, “I ate the fried Tatsuta fried whale for the first time in a while, but it was delicious while it was warm. I would like consumers to understand the taste of whale meat at the store.” He expressed his expectation that whale meat consumption would expand.