Closing down the whaling industry is possible when the tourism industry will compensate for the losses.

At least, that is a courageous suggestion from Professor Clevo Wilson from the Queensland University of Technology. Wilson claims “What we are trying to do is compensate those who are giving up on whaling, those who are giving up on jobs. As long as they're compensated I suppose that they will give up whaling.”

However, Fraser Coast whale watch operators like Peter Lynch considers the proposed levy a burden on the tourism industry.

Lynch insisted, “We are doing our bit for conservation because all those who come and see the whales get very passionate about it as well.” An additional economic pressure on the operators, he said, could result in “less operators, therefore you get less people seeing the whales and less interest in protecting them.”

During the June 2010 meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) in Morocco, representatives from Japan, Iceland, and Norway have urged the organization to lift the ban. The IWC meeting ended with an agreement by consensus to revise the quotas for indigenous whaling in the Greenlandic hunts.

The IWC revised annual strike limits for West Greenland are “178 common minke whales (from 200 on the basis of scientific advice), 10 fin whales (from 19 on a voluntary basis), 2 bowhead whales (as before) and 9 humpback whales (a new quota within scientific advice).”