Norway whalers' quota to stay at 20-year high

OSLO, Dec 2 (Reuters) Norway's whalers has won permits to harpoon 1,052 whales in 2007, matching this year's quota that was the highest in two decades despite a global moratorium.

Environmental groups Greenpeace condemned the hunt and said that the quota was ''meaningless'' when whalers only managed to catch 546 minke whales in 2006. Whalers welcomed a decision to let them hunt more whales near the coast, saving time and fuel.

''The total quota next year will be the same as this year,'' acting Fisheries Minister Dag Terje Andersen said in a statement of the quota of 1,052 minke whales for the summer-time hunts.

Whale meat is usually eaten as steaks, in stews or burgers.

Norway says that minke whales are plentiful in the North Atlantic -- unlike threatened blue whales that were hunted to the brink of extinction before a 1986 moratorium on all whaling by the International Whaling Commission (IWC).

''This is good northern policy in practice. The government's quota decision lays the foundations for a profitable development of the whaling business,'' said Rune Froevik, leader of the pro-whaling High North Alliance.

But Brad Smith of Greenpeace said: ''Keeping such a high quota is totally meaningless considering that the quotas have not been met since Norway resumed (commercial) whaling in 1993.'' Iceland joined Norway this year as the only other nation that sanctions ''commercial'' hunts of whales. Japan catches hundreds of minke whales but says it is for scientific research.

Andersen said that whalers could harpoon 900 animals off Norway, from the North Sea to the Arctic Barents Sea, up from about 600 in the same coastal regions in 2006.

This year 443 of the quota was reserved for whales in remote waters off Jan Mayen island in the North Atlantic, where not a single animal was caught. Whalers said it was uneconomic to travel so far because of high fuel prices.

For 2007, the Jan Mayen quota would be axed to 152.

Smith at Greenpeace said the leftist government was apparently trying to shore up the fisheries industry with a sop of whaling when far-reaching reforms were needed for remote coastal communities suffering from low fish stocks.

In June, the whaling nations were emboldened by winning a pro-whaling vote at the IWC for the first time in 20 years.

The 33-32 vote declaring that the whaling ban was no longer necessary fell far short, however, of a 75 percent majority needed to overthrow the moratorium.

REUTERS SB RAI0926