This year’s whale hunting season is being postponed due to the veterinarians’ strike, and five weeks of the season have already passed.
Whale hunting season normally begins in early May, and extends to late August or early September. RÚV reports that this has not been the case this year, on account of the veterinarians’ strike, which began in late April and is still ongoing.
As vets play a legally essential role in the inspection of meat, whale hunters have not been able to head to sea yet this year, and the season is already five weeks passed.
“[The strikes] have a profound effect on us,” Gunnar Bergmann Jónsson, a ship owner for whaling company IP útgerð, told reporters. “It will take time for us to work our way out of this.”
While it is uncertain when the strikes will end, Gunnar says that when they do, his company will seek to hunt between 30 to 40 minke whales – provided the season is still ongoing when the strikes end.
UPDATE: Striking vets will not stop whale hunting – RÚV now reports that IP útgerð has already landed two minke whales, which will be put on ice pending the end of the strike.
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