Ecoceanos and Cetacea Conservation Center Launch Campaign Against Government’s Plan to Cull Sea Lions

Chilean civil society organizations Ecoceanos and the Cetacea Conservation Center (CCC) have initiated a national and international campaign titled No + Matanzas de Lobos Marinos, aiming to «stop the government’s ecocidal proposal under José Antonio Kast to open hunting for common sea lions (Otaria flavescens), claiming there is a plague of these marine mammals.»

In a statement, both organizations condemned the government for blaming these animals «for the over-exploitation currently affecting 53% of national fisheries, as well as for the economic and social crisis facing artisanal fishing communities in Chilean waters.»

They recalled that a similar call to mobilization and citizen resistance took place in 2012, when over 100,000 people supported a petition driven by Ecoceanos and other civic organizations, resulting in the then-President Piñera’s government abandoning a similar ecocidal initiative.

«That citizen momentum encouraged a group of parliamentarians at the time to propose legislation aimed at permanently prohibiting the hunting of sea lions in the country. However, due to pressures from the fishing and salmon industries, the initiative failed to progress,» the organizations recalled.

«Now, 14 years later, the Kast government, through the Subsecretariat of Fisheries led by Osvaldo Urrutia – a former advisor and lobbyist for the National Fishing Society (Sonapesca) – seeks to revive a proposal aimed at clearing the presence of common sea lions from the fishing and industrial salmon farming areas of the country,» the issued statement adds.

Sea Lions as ‘Scapegoats’ for the Fishing Crisis

The resistance campaign launched by Ecoceanos and the CCC claims that the interests of the current government, the industry, and certain fishing leaders aim to turn sea lions into scapegoats, holding them accountable for the environmental marine mega-crisis and diverting attention from their actual culprits.

According to Juan Carlos Cárdenas, director of Ecoceanos, «the real predator of Chilean fisheries and resources relied upon by small-scale artisanal fishing is not the sea lions, but the greed, commercial interests, and unscrupulousness of politicians, businesspeople, and some artisanal fishing leaders who operate unchecked in Chile.»

Ecoceanos emphasizes that the notion of a ‘plague of sea lions’ lacks scientific backing: «Official censuses from the Chilean state, updated in 2019, show that the population of common sea lions varies between 112,000 and 150,000 individuals, a figure that does not indicate overpopulation at all.»

«In the remote regions of Chilean Patagonia, where the transnational salmon industry plans its major expansion by 2040, the Kast government relies on the interests of some fishing leaders to implement a plan for indiscriminate hunting, all without updated regional censuses to determine the true status of these mammals, which are essential for the functioning of marine ecosystems,» the organizations warned.

A Slaughter Without Precedent in Latin America

Should the government initiative be approved, Chile would become the only country in Latin America and the second in the entire Southern Hemisphere to carry out such barbaric and irrational slaughters.

«Our international image would be comparable to that of Namibia in southern Africa, where such killings have not solved their fishing crisis. On the contrary, they have irreparably damaged the country’s international reputation as a nature tourism destination and negatively impacted marine trophic networks,» warned Elsa Cabrera, executive director of the Cetacea Conservation Center.

The economic consequences for Chile would also be dire, according to the expert.

«The Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA) of the U.S., which will apply to our country as an exporter on January 1, 2026, requires comparable conservation programs between both states. Thus, opening these slaughters would jeopardize millions in exports of marine products, in a scenario where the salmon, fishing, agricultural, and forestry sectors are already facing tariffs of 12.5%,» stated Elsa Cabrera.

Finally, the Cetacea Conservation Center and Ecoceanos reiterated that the approval of the slaughter plan would mark the first step towards dismantling over 20 years of marine mammal conservation policies in Chile and could open a new attempt to resume whaling.

One of these policies is the Cetacean Protection Law, promulgated in 2008, which established Chile’s jurisdictional waters as one of the largest whale sanctuaries in the world.

«This proposal is extremely dangerous because if the government and fishing interests currently use sea lions as an excuse, they will do the same with whales and dolphins in the future, just like Japan, which annually kills hundreds of large and small cetaceans without any scientific justification,» Cabrera asserted.

The Cetacea Conservation Center and Ecoceanos stress that the campaign aims not only to prevent the government proposal but also to reactivate «historic legislative initiatives aimed at permanently prohibiting the commercial hunting of sea lions, to prevent the potential commercialization of their genitalia in Asian markets for alleged aphrodisiac purposes, their capture for display in zoos and their export to international aquariums.»

The organizers invite national and international citizens to sign the petition addressed to the Subsecretariat of Fishing and to follow the campaign’s progress on the social media accounts of Centro Ecoceanos and CCC.