Ottawa pressured to stop trans-shipments of whale meat

[A] Toronto lawyer... has provided the federal government with a legal opinion supporting public cries for Canada to stop serving as a transshipment destination for the trade in meat from endangered whales between Iceland and Japan.

...Ottawa has the power to stop shipments of “endangered whale meat” under existing federal legislation — the Wild Animal and Plant Protection and Regulation of International and Interprovincial Trade Act (1992).

The act (WAPPRIITA) is meant to prevent Canada from becoming a country of convenience for trade in illegal wildlife, he says, adding “Canada is not obligated to permit whale meat to pass through its borders.”...

Canada said ... it is helpless to stop the trade, even though it is a signatory to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), which in 1981 listed the fin and other endangered whales under Appendix 1 — the highest level of protection against commercial trade.

Iceland and Japan are also signatories to the convention but did not agree to the 1981 listing. As a result, Canada says the trade in whale meat between the two nations is legal, even when using Canada as a trans-shipment destination.

“When two countries do so, like Iceland and Japan have for fin whale, Canada has to allow shipments under customs control to transit provided they meet normal documentation and other requirements,” Environment Canada said in a statement.

Canada did inspect the whale meat under the authority of WAPPRIITA and even conducted DNA samples to confirm it was correctly labelled, and then sent it on its way.

Ruby argues in response that WAPPRIITA trumps CITES in this case and that Environment Canada “has the power to prevent the shipment of whale meat from entering Canada without a permit,” even if the product is being transshipped...

Fin whales are globally rated as endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. In Canada, they are officially a threatened species, listed under the federal Species At Risk Act.

The fin whale is the second largest creature on Earth after the blue whale. Fin whales reach physical maturity at 25 years of age, and range in size from 20 to 27 metres, and 60 to 80 tonnes, according to the federal fisheries department.

This has been excerpted from the 2 March 2014 article by the Vancouver Sun, and is available in its entirety at http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Ottawa+pressured+stop+trans+shipments+whale+meat/9570277/story.html.