Save Eco Destinations

The Japanese whaling fleet in action.

Japan has been facing widespread criticism since it said it will be using some of the public funds allocated for disaster reconstruction to buttress its whaling operations. Instead of going to help fishing communities and others devastated by the 11 March earthquake and tsunami, a portion of the funds will go to strengthen security for the country’s divisive annual whaling hunt. Classy.

The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society (SSCS) and Greenpeace accused the Japanese Government of spending an extra USD 30 million on increased security for the whalers, whose efforts are regularly affronted by anti-whaling groups.

The awesome Paul Watson.

“I think that it’s totally disgraceful,” SSCS Captain Paul Watson stated. “People from around the world sending money to help the victims of the tsunami-earthquake were not expecting their money to be used to fund killing whales in the Southern Ocean.”

Before the Japanese fleet departed for Antarctica earlier this week, the coast guard informed it would be sending out guards to protect it from environmental activists, AFP reports.

Fisheries Agency official Tatsuya Nakaoku said the move would ultimately help people who depend on whaling and whose livelihoods were ruined by the tsunami.

“The government will support the reconstruction effort of a whaling town and nearby areas,” he said. “This programme can help it reconstruct food processing plants there…”

“Many people in the area eat whale meat, too. They are waiting for Japan’s commercial whaling to resume,” he retorted.

Last February, the defiant actions of Sea Shepherd prompted Japan to shorten its hunt for the 2010-11 season by a month — after catching only one-fifth of its planned bounty.

Japan intends to kill almost 1,000 whales this time around, The Guardian reports.

In November, the Japanese Government approved a USD 1.6 billion extra budget, the third of 2011, to fund reconstruction and boost the economy lagging from the impact of the March disaster. Of the USD 64.2 million designated for fisheries-related spending, USD 29.3 million were earmarked for “stabilising whaling research.”

“We will bolster measures against acts of sabotage by anti-whaling groups so as to stably carry out the Antarctic whaling research,” the fisheries department then said.

Sea Shepherd is ready to confront the Japanese fleet. Three of the green group’s ships will set sail next week, The Sydney Morning Herald reports.

“We are hoping to deter their operations,” Watson said. “I assume the security vessels will try and dislodge us. I am assuming there will be some difficult confrontations.”

SSCS asked Australia to send a vessel down to keep the peace, but the country refused, he told.

Whale meat at the Tsukiji fish market, 2008

Japan also approached Australia – asking to help protect it from groups like Sea Shepherd – to no avail. Apparently Australia doesn’t buy that Japan whales for scientific purposes, which is what Japan has claimed for a long time.

Australia does not “buy for one minute this argument,” said Australian Environment Minister Tony Burke.

“You don’t travel from one side of the globe to the other to harpoon whales and chop them up in the name of science,” he snapped.

Excellent.

Meanwhile, the clamor got louder this week when Latin American members of the International Whaling Commission urged Japan to halt its “scientific” whaling in Antarctica and respect sanctuaries.

Save the whales!

Note: Even I’m sick of discussing it, but I can’t help myself.

The swine flu/H1N1 rage is over or dwindling in many parts of the world (and yes, growing in some). 70 deaths in Mexico now. And millions due to the regular flu, by the way.

I just want to say, all the overreacting has caused me to postpone my vacation. First, it was just going to be a few weeks. Now, for reasons external to H1N1 but impacted by the postponed trip, it will be a few months. No good.

Pigs are abused in factory farms

So I hope the rest of you have had better luck and suffered from no panic, or at least were able to control the media’s flu frenzy. It’s too bad that countries have been shutting people out and blocking people in due to this. And that masks, paranoia and general anxiety have been cutting us off from one another! You know, I was afraid people would give me dirty looks on the plane and at airports since I suffer from allergies and frequently blow my nose. But I am speaking even of those who do not.

And a big no-no to you, big pharma, for feeding it (and sponsoring it? Most likely!). Bad big pharma. Bad.

Oh, and if you wanted environment-related news regarding H1N1, the Huffington Post has posted a few links. (I just didn’t find them relevant enough to the usual topics to discuss here.) And let me repeat that I blame Big Pharma, not factory farms, for the virus. Although, factory farms are horrible. Go vegetarian! Ok, no pressure.

Fishing in the Kawabe River

The Construction Ministry in Tokyo wants to build a dam on the Kawabe River in southern Japan, and everyone seems to be against it. At least for now, the dissenters are winning.

Environmentalists, farmers, and fishermen and women are objecting to the project on various grounds. Environmentalists are worried that a dam will damage the scenic gorges. Farmers assert they do not need irrigation water from the reservoir. Commercial fishermen and women are worried fish would swim elsewhere if the river torrents become blocked by the dam. Not to mention that half a dozen small villages had already been relocated for the future building of the damn dam. And what for? Purportedly, for irrigation (which farmers tell us they don’t need) and flood control (which dams have a bad reputation for preventing in Hitoyoshi).

And so these people got together and set up a petition opposing the $3.6 million project. They got 34,000 signatures, half of the residents in the city of Hitoyoshi.

Last September, this group gained the support of the governor of the Kumamoto prefecture, Ikuo Kabashima. Kabashima then requested that Tokyo suspend the dam’s construction (which, again, hadn’t yet begun). Tokyo consented. Thank goodness.

This is a big deal because usually local governors are essentially ignored by Japan’s central government, which gets to decide what happens all over the country despite what the locals might want. Kabashima stood up to the central government both because he empathizes with the plight of the locals, and because he thinks the central government exercises too much power in these situations.

This phenomenon spawned others (yay!). Other regional governments throughout Japan spoke up against plans to build dams in their prefectures. In November, four prefectural governments in the western Kensai region asked to have the dam project cancelled. Last month, the governor of the Niigata prefecture said he would not help finance a new bullet train line and the governor of Osaka refused to pay for a new bridge to an airport.

Now, some of these oppositions are due to the global economic crisis-budgets are limited. Regardless, this gradual deconstruction of the central government tyranny is something to be both noted and celebrated.

And there’s more: the Liberal Democratic Party is drawing up a bill to turn Japan’s 47 prefectures into 9-13 entities with enough power to balance out the central government’s. This may not happen anytime soon, though, as Prime Minister Taro Aso, who proposed the bill, is not very popular right now. But many are standing up to Japan’s central government, so something substantial is absolutely taking place, bill or no bill.

Read more.

Goes to show what grassroots power can do.