Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps her Department is taking to push for the abolition of whale hunting in the Faroe Islands.

The UK is strongly opposed to the hunting of any cetaceans (whales, dolphins and porpoises), other than some limited activities by indigenous people for clearly defined purposes. We believe that the hunting of cetaceans is unacceptably cruel and that well-managed, responsible tourism is the only truly sustainable interaction with these animals.

While we recognise there is a long tradition in the Faroe Islands of killing pilot whales and dolphins for meat and other products, we have long expressed our concern over the welfare and sustainability aspects of the Faroese cetacean hunts and the levels of domestic regulation currently in place. We have urged the Faroe Islands to look at alternatives to the hunting of cetaceans, encouraging them to consider the many economic and social benefits that responsible cetacean watching can bring to coastal communities. Most recently, during the Joint Committee on Trade with the Faroe Islands earlier this year, we raised the UK’s opposition to the continued hunting of cetaceans in the Faroe Islands on both animal welfare and conservation grounds.

We also work through multilateral agreements to condemn these hunts. This includes leading the drafting of a letter from the ASCOBANS (Agreement on the Conservation of Small Cetaceans of the Baltic, North-East Atlantic, Irish and North Seas) Advisory Committee to the Faroese Government. In addition, at the recent IWC meeting in October 2022, the UK Commissioner made clear the UK’s ongoing concerns about small cetacean hunts in the Faroe Islands.

The Government will continue advocating at every appropriate opportunity for the end of cetacean hunts in the Faroe Islands.