From Dolphin Hunting to Dolphin Watching 

Dolphin Watching was started by an active fisherman at Futo, where the drive fishery has been carried out. I/We request the Ito City Fishing Cooperative and its Futo Branch to stop the drive hunt of dolphins and, instead, to support the dolphin watching.

Criticism has increasingly arisen worldwide not only against killing and slaughter of dolphins in drives, but also against their capture to sell to the aquarium industry, for research on dolphin ecology in recent years is showing that the very act of capturing dolphins and keeping them in tanks is cruelty to animals.

Drive fisheries, killing and capturing dolphins, greatly harm the image of Ito-city, which is a tourism and hot-spring recreation city with scenic beauty. Continuing the drive hunts will bring Ito city global criticism as a “wild animal consumer” that profits financially from them.

I/We sincerely request the Ito City Fishing Cooperative and its Futo Branch to stop drive hunts, killing and capturing dolphins, and switch to dolphin watching which is a positive action to coexist with dolphins.