Friday 18 June 2010

A 70 year-old, 16 metre, 41,000 kilo* reason why ethical investors, responsible corporations and caring consumers should avoid Sigma-Aldrich


Sperm Whale photograph from The Telegraph U.K.

An adult male Sperm Whale can live to around 70 years of age, reach up to 16 metres in length and weigh-in at approximately 41,000 kilograms.*

This impressive cetacean species was overhunted in the past and is still on the ICUN vulnerable species index, along with pygmy and dwarf sperm whales.

Yet Sigma-Aldrich is defying Australia's ban on whale products and selling myoglobin taken from whale skeletal muscle in this country.

The Age on June 16 2010:

THE Australian arm of global drug company Sigma-Aldrich has confirmed it has sold a sperm whale extract, as a new European report warns of a second wave of commercial whaling.
Sigma-Aldrich's Sydney office said its call centre had handled limited sales of myoglobin taken from sperm whale skeletal muscle.
Myoglobin is used as a biochemical marker for diagnosis of heart attack. Sigma-Aldrich was yesterday advertising the product for sale at $475.86 a milligram on its website, but last night the price had been removed......
The sale of whale products is illegal in Australia under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act. Their importation has been banned since 1981.

The Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society has recently released its May 2010 trade report Reinventing the Whale which suggests that: ..the real reason behind the whaling nations desire to lift the whaling moratorium – they have long-term plans to develop new commercial applications for whale oil including in pharmaceuticals and animal feed.

From the trade report:

As part of our research we searched patent registries in a number of countries for inventions listing whale oil, spermaceti, whale cartilage etc.

We were surprised to find thousands of approved patents for products or processes listing whales as a possible ingredient - from golf balls to hair dye; eco-friendly laundry detergent to confectionaries/candy; and health drinks to bio-diesel.

Many were for international use and approved recently.

This does not mean that the patented product is currently in production using whales; in most cases, the inventors will probably have replicated a list of potential ingredients from an earlier patent of a similar product without having tested whale oil themselves and with no plan to use it. However, in light of our other findings, we are concerned that in some cases the patent is a place-holder pending the resumption of international trade in whale products.

We include details of a mere fraction of the patents we found to illustrate what WDCS believes to be significant potential for the reestablishment of whales as an industrial ingredient.

We provide the number, date and country of issue of each patent noted in this report, but more details of all patents identified in our research can be found at http://www.wdcs.org/........

Numerous other patents issued in Japan for food products, or food production processes, refer to whales as a possible source of ingredients.

These include 'whale gelatin' for health drinks (patent approved in 1999) and products to relieve pre-menstrual symptoms (2003); 'whale wax' for jelly candy (1999); hydrogenated whale oil for breads (1991); and whale oil for confectionary coatings for ice cream and doughnuts (2000), melt-resistant chocolate (2008), as well as for use in conjunction with Coenzyme Q10 in dairy and a wide range of other products (2010).

Several of these inventions have also received patents in the USA. Indeed, despite the fact that the USA prohibits the sale, import, and export of any marine mammal part or product, the US Food and Drug Administration continues to list whale products, such as hydrogenated sperm oil, and spermaceti wax, as safe and allowable food additives and lubricants in bakery pans.

Sigma-Aldrich Corp share price.

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