Industrial Whaling in the Arctic and Antarctic
The chapter titled "Industrial Whaling in the Arctic and Antarctic" by Bjørn L. Basberg and Louwrens Hacquebord has been published in The Cambridge History of the Polar Regions.
Abstract
Compared with many other regions of the world, the polar regions have not been areas with much industry. The few exceptions, both north and south, have mostly been associated with resource exploitation: fur-hunting, sealing, whaling, mining – and also tourism. Therefore, in economic-geographical publications, the polar regions have usually been described as Resource Frontier Regions. Considering both the Arctic and the Antarctic, whaling stands out in terms of the very long time period in which it has continuously been undertaken – and in terms of its scale.