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32 Animal Welfare Inst. Q. 1 (1983-1984)

handle is hein.animal/awiqu0032 and id is 1 raw text is: THE ANIMAL WELFARE INSTITUTE QUARTERLY P.O. Box 3650 Washington, D.C. 20007 Spring 1983 Vol. 32 No. 1 CITES: three whales The following article is based on informa- tion which AW1 requested from the eminent whale scientist. Sidney Holt, in or- der to clarify certain proposals on whales that will be put to the CITES nations meet- ing in Botswana on 19-30 April. At a meeting in Nairobi last November, African members of CITES who attended gave unanimous backing to three Appen- dix I proposals on whales which will now be put to all CITES parties in Botswana. The proposals require the immediate listing of the Bryde's whale and two genera of beaked whale, and the listing by 1 January 1986 (when commercial whaling is due to cease) of all whales that come under the aegis of the IWC. Because the Bryde's and the minke are now the only baleen whales for which the IWC permits a catch, trading pressure could become severe. In the case of the Bryde's whale the IWC permits hunting of only three coastal stocks, one off Peru and the other two in the North Pacific. In other regions zero quotas have been set on the grounds that the populations are unknown. The North Pacific catch is sizeable (over 500 annually) and is not based on scientific assessment of the stock. However international trade is not involved. The Peruvian stock is a very small one and the permitted catch cannot be scientifically justified. The catch in this case is internationally traded - it is all sold to Japan for meat. But the rationale for Appendix I listing of the Bryde's is not solely to stop trade in this one stock. Without such a listing pirate whalers operating outside the IWC would find it considerably easier to market illicitly taken Bryde's whales. There is the further point that at the last CITES conference (New Delhi, 1981) the sei, fin and sperm whale were all given Ap- pendix I listing. The case for the Bryde's proposals on whale is no less strong. Indeed it is, if any- thing, stronger. For while there is uncer- tainty about the status of all four species, the one Bryde's stock that is internationally traded is known to be depleted to the point of being endangered. And because the Bryde's and the minke are now the only The one Bryde's stock that is in- ternationally traded is known to be depleted to the point of being endangered. baleen whales for which the IWC permits a catch, trading pressure could become se- vere - especially as trade statistics make no distinction between different types of baleen meat. (Continued on page 2) New Dole bill for laboratory animals benator Bob Dole (R-Kansas) introduced a new bill, S. 657, the Improved Standards for Laboratory Animals Act as an amend- ment to the Animal Welfare Act. In his in- troductory statement he pointed to the val- ue of the institutional committees man- dated by the bill noting that they could make USDA's inspections more effective without increasing Government costs. Each committee would include a member not affiliated with the faculty to be primari- ly responsible for representing community concerns regarding the welfare of animal subjeGts. (Continued on page 5) NationalResearch Council recommends alternative tests Proponents of animal welfare legisla- tion are likely to find fuel for their argu- ment in a recent report by the National Research Council, writes Marjorie Sun in Science, 25 February 1983. In the testing of chemical mutagens 'There has been spectacular progress in developinq short term tests that use microorganisms and mammalian cell cultures,' stated the report, Identifying and Estimating the Genetic Impact of Chemical Mutagens. 'These tests are sensitive, efficient, reproducible, and inexpensive.' According to the National Research Council press release, 'It is neither necessary nor feasible to use mammals for initial screening,' the committee told the U.S. Environmental Protec- tion Agency (EPA). Tests with bacteria can be completed in a few days, and tests with mammalian cells in culture require only a few weeks, the commit- tee pointed out. Mouse tests are not only much more expensive, but re- quire several months. With some 70,000 man-made chemicals in com- mercial use, it is important to have several rapid, sensitive, inexpensive tests available, the committee con- cluded. The committee proposed that the EPA adopt a two-tiered screening process for environmental chemicals. At the first level, the chemical would be test- ed on the bacterium Salmonella and on mouse, Chinese hamster, or hu- man cells in culture. If these tests are negative, the committee said, the chemical is presumed not to be a mammalian mutagen. If two or more (Continued on page 7) iji 'F)

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