A Gray Seal

Nov. 6, 2003 — The Baltic Sea seal population has bounced back from the days when the species was threatened and can now — thanks to increased protection and less pollution — tolerate more hunting, researchers said Wednesday.

"There is a very clear increase that has happened since the 1970s, when they were very threatened," Olavi Stenman, a scientist with the Finnish Game and Fisheries Research Institute, told AFP.

"Thanks to protection, the population has started to recover again," said Stenman.

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At the end of the 1970s, the seal population in the Baltic Sea had dwindled to around 15,000 as a result of intensive hunting and pollution, which caused deformations in the reproductive organs of female ring seals, he said.

A ban on seal hunting was introduced in the late 1970s, and that, together with the prohibition of toxic pollutants, has enabled stocks to reach almost 20,000, most of which are found in Finnish waters, Stenman said.

Around 13,000 of them are gray seals and more than 5,000 are ring seals, he said.

In 1997, the population was considered healthy enough to sustain hunting again, and licenses for 30 animals were issued.

This figure has been gradually increased, with 230 licenses issued last year. However, only some 100 seals were actually killed because of the small number of hunters, Stenman noted.

For this season, the quota has again been raised to 400, but only 150 seals are likely to be hunted, he said.

In neighboring Sweden, which also borders the Baltic, the 2003 quota is for 170 seals.

The seal hunt is highly controversial, with environmentalists lobbying for a new hunting ban.

But as the seals increasingly damage fishing nets and feed on fish stocks, the Finnish government has decided to continue to allow hunting.