Norway Whalers' Quota to Stay at 20-Year High

Norway Whalers' Quota to Stay at 20-Year High
NORWAY: December 4, 2006

OSLO - Norway's whalers won permits on Friday to harpoon 1,052 whales in
2007, matching this year's quota that was the highest in two decades despite
a global moratorium.

Environmental groups Greenpeace condemned the hunt and said that the quota
was "meaningless" when whalers only managed to catch 546 minke whales in
2006. Whalers welcomed a decision to let them hunt more whales near the
coast, saving time and fuel.
"The total quota next year will be the same as this year," acting Fisheries
Minister Dag Terje Andersen said in a statement of the quota of 1,052 minke
whales for the summer-time hunts.

Whale meat is usually eaten as steaks, in stews or burgers.

Norway says that minke whales are plentiful in the North Atlantic -- unlike
threatened blue whales that were hunted to the brink of extinction before a
1986 moratorium on all whaling by the International Whaling Commission
(IWC).

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