Commercial fin whale hunting is once more a reality in Iceland, with two fin whales killed today after a two-year pause in hunting. The decision to resume has been met with disbelief by conservationists and strong criticism from campaigners within Iceland itself alongside international condemnation.
According to reports from WDC, Icelandic whaling company Hvalur hf. has sent it’s first two vessels of the season out to sea and killed two animals from Iceland’s 2026 quota of 150 fin whales. A quota of 168 minke whales has also been set, although minke whaling has largely died out in Iceland in recent years.
The news is deeply troubling. Fin whales are the second-largest animals on Earth, surpassed only by blue whales, and remain listed globally as vulnerable. At a time when whales face increasing pressure from ship strikes, entanglement, underwater noise, pollution and climate change, the return of commercial hunting feels not only unnecessary, but completely out of step with modern marine conservation.
The decision is also being challenged inside Iceland. Icelandic media outlet Vísir has reported that Hvalavinir — Whale Friends — has written to the country’s Minister of Industries calling on the government to stop the hunt. Its chair, Valgerður Árnadóttir, said whaling cannot be carried out humanely and warned that the suffering involved breaches Iceland’s own animal welfare laws. Her central message was stark: “not one whale must die this summer.”
That domestic opposition is significant. Too often, commercial whaling is presented internationally as a matter of national tradition or cultural identity. Yet Icelandic campaigners are making clear that this is not a settled national view. Hvalavinir says most Icelanders do not eat whale meat, and its own polling summary states that 51% of Icelanders oppose whaling, compared with just 29% in favour.
The economic case also appears increasingly weak. Valgerður Árnadóttir told SeafoodSource there is “absolutely no good reason” to continue whaling, arguing that it is not profitable, is not a living cultural tradition and relies largely on exports to Japan — a market where demand has declined and competition from Japan’s own whaling industry has grown.
The welfare concerns are particularly grave. Iceland’s last whaling season, in 2023, was overshadowed by animal welfare controversy after footage from whaling vessels exposed the suffering of hunted whales. The Reykjavík Grapevine reported that Icelanders saw whales killed with explosive harpoons, and that 24 whales were killed during the shortened 2023 season, including a pregnant female.
But the concern goes much deeper than public outrage. Official welfare scrutiny of the 2022 hunt found that some whales endured prolonged deaths, including animals taking more than an hour - and in one case up to two hours - to die, with some needing repeated harpoon strikes. Iceland’s expert Animal Welfare Board concluded that the methods used did not comply with the country’s Animal Welfare Act. Further monitoring found that welfare problems persisted even after tighter rules were introduced.
In other words, this is not a case where better regulation has solved the problem. The evidence points to a much starker conclusion: large whales cannot be reliably killed humanely at sea. Allowing the hunt to resume now means proceeding in the face of Iceland’s own expert warnings.
The political situation is equally striking. Iceland’s current government has signalled that it intends to bring forward legislation in the autumn that could ban commercial whaling. Yet unless action is taken sooner, Hvalur hf. may still be able to hunt this summer before any new law is in place.
Iceland is now one of only a handful of countries, alongside Norway and Japan, still allowing commercial whaling despite the global moratorium adopted by the International Whaling Commission in 1986.
As vital parts of ocean ecosystems, as sentient beings, and as ambassadors for the wild seas that so many people travel to Iceland to experience, whales have a value rather than a price.
At a moment when Iceland has the chance to consign commercial whaling to history, allowing another season of killing would be a tragic and avoidable step backwards.
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