Boston, MA, March 14, 2015
A mobile billboard—funded by a coalition of U.S. animal protection and conservation organizations—will take the message “Don’t Buy From Icelandic Whalers” to the streets of Boston this week.
The large billboard makes its debut at the Kendall Square Cinema today, coinciding with a showing of Icelandic films sponsored by Iceland Naturally, a marketing program developed by Icelandic companies to increase demand for Icelandic products, including frozen seafood. The billboard will be prominently displayed throughout the area surrounding the Boston Convention and Exposition Center, site of the Seafood Expo North America (SENA) taking place Sunday, March 15, through Tuesday, March 17. The billboard will also make apperances at seafood restaurants and other locations throughout the city, including Legal Seafoods Harborside and Tavern Road Restaurant.
The billboard asks viewers, “Do you know who caught your seafood?” and features the stylized image of a whale. The ad directs viewers to its campaign website DontBuyFromIcelandicWhalers.com, which provides more information, including a video and an infographic, about Iceland’s Hvalur whaling company, responsible for the deaths of 551 endangered fin whales since 2006. The website also identifies which North American businesses purchase seafood from companies linked to Hvalur, and tells consumers how to take action against Icelandic whaling.
Leading seafood company HB Grandi, which is exhibiting at SENA, is one of the businesses tied to Hvalur. Iceland’s Minister of Fisheries, SigurðurIngi Jóhannsson, is expected to speak at a seminar at the SENA on Monday, March 16. Jóhannsson has continued to sanction a whaling quota for Iceland, despite the International Whaling Commission’s commercial whaling ban.
The “Don’t Buy from Icelandic Whalers” campaign is organized by members of the WhalesNeedUS coalition. The coalition is comprised of several organizations, including the Animal Welfare Institute (AWI), Greenpeace USA, Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), Whale and Dolphin Conservation North America (WDC-NA), World Animal Protection, the Nantucket Marine Mammal Conservation Program (NMMCP), the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA), Dolphin Connection, and the Whaleman Foundation.
“We are here to remind the supermarket, food service, and restaurant representatives attending Seafood Expo North America that they need to listen to their customers, who clearly do not want to buy fish from whalers,” said Susan Millward, executive director of AWI.
“Commercial whaling for products few people want makes no sense in the 21st century,” said Phil Kline, senior oceans campaigner at Greenpeace USA. “It's bad for business.”
“Fish sticks shouldn’t fund whaling,” said Taryn Keikow Heimer, senior policy analyst at NRDC. “People would be shocked to know that fish coming from HB Grandi is tainted with the blood of endangered whales. Now is the time for businesses and consumers to use their economic muscle to stop Iceland’s renegade whaling.”
“The message is simple,” said Regina Asmutis-Silvia, executive director of WDC-NA. “If you purchase HB Grandi fish, you are helping to bankroll fin whaling.”
“By refusing to buy from HB Grandi, US seafood companies can send a powerful message that the continued hunting of whales will not be tolerated,” said Elizabeth Hogan, campaign manager for Oceans & Wildlife at World Animal Protection. “We commend the businesses that are taking a stand to protect fin whales and urge everyone who buys seafood to show that whaling has no place today.”
“Recent scientific studies have shown that whales have cultures, passing down knowledge from generation to generation,” said Scott Leonard, director of operations at NNMCP. “It is arrogant on the part of Iceland to put such cultures in peril by hunting an endangered species for profit, in defiance of the commercial whaling ban.”
"Don't kill endangered fin whales,” said Allan Thornton, president of EIA. “Stop Iceland's illegal hunt."