Facts about Commercial Whaling
- 07
Factory ships introduced in the 1920s could process entire whales at sea, increasing commercial whaling efficiency and allowing whalers to pursue species in remote Antarctic waters.
- 06
Antarctic blue whales, hunted to near extinction by 1966, numbered over 360,000 before commercial whaling reduced their population to approximately 5,000 individuals.
- 05
Whale oil from commercial whaling powered the global economy for over two centuries, with a single sperm whale yielding up to 500 gallons of oil used for lighting and lubrication until petroleum replaced it in the 1800s.
- 04
Norway, Japan, and Iceland continue commercial whaling operations outside the IWC moratorium, with Norway killing over 500 minke whales annually since 1993.
- 03
The sperm whale population in the North Atlantic declined from approximately 1.3 million whales in 1710 to just 5,000 by the 1950s due to commercial whaling.
- 02
During the 1960s peak, commercial whaling fleets killed approximately 66,000 whales annually across all ocean basins worldwide.
- 01
In 1986, the International Whaling Commission established a moratorium on commercial whaling that remains in effect for most nations today.