International Whaling Commission

The report covering the eleventh fiscal year, June 1, 1959, to May 31, 1960, of the International Whaling Commission, including the eleventh meeting of the Commission, held in London from June 22 to July 1, 1959, and also the meeting of the Commission's ad hoc Scientific Committee, held in London from May 10 to 13, 1960 was presented and approved by the Commission at its twelfth meeting in that city in June 1960. As no proposals were made at the eleventh meeting for altering the blue whale unit limit on baleen whales taken in the Antarctic, it remained the same (15,000 units) as for the previous season, and in the 1959/1960 season there were again twenty pelagic expeditions operating in the Antarctic, although the total number of catchers operating with the twenty expeditions was reduced from 235 in the previous season to 217, distributed among Japan, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, Norway, and the Netherlands. The period over which the Antarctic catch was taken was considerably longer than in the previous three seasons, since, in accordance with a decision reached at the eleventh meeting of the Commission, the fin and sei whale season had opened ten days earlier than previously, although the opening date of the blue whale season had remained unaltered. Expeditions also continued whaling longer than in the previous season, the catching period for all the expeditions taken together averaging about 99 days in contrast to the 69-day total of the year 1958/1959, while the increase in the total catch was a little over 1 percent, consisting mainly of fin and sei whales.