When the whaling ships return from the Southern Ocean this spring, they hope to bring in a haul of almost 1,000 minke whales — 40 per cent more than last year. But this year their controversial catch, which the whalers claim is a by-product of scientific research, will not be eagerly received.

The commercial freezers of the whale meat industry are already stuffed with 2,700 tonnes of uneaten stock, and the public appetite for the flesh is dwindling so fast that much of it will end up as pet food or in school dinners.

The Japanese Government’s response has been to begin an extraordinary drive to promote the gastronomic delights of the “scrumptious whale”.

One website selling whale meat for pets shows a picture of a dog with the slogans: “I’m Charlie. I love whale meat!” and “Pets love whale meat too.”

Whale burgers and whale spaghetti bolognese are appearing on school menus and the meat is being distributed to old people’s homes.

The promotional campaign has been seized on by environmentalists and anti-whaling groups, who say it gives the lie to Japan’s argument that it kills whales for scientific, not cultural or commercial, reasons.

“Japan’s real whaling agenda has never been about science, but is primarily economic,” said Mark Simmonds, scientific director of the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society.

“By taking this into schools, they are trying to get children interested in eating whale meat so they continue to want it as they grow up, and create a new and enduring marketplace.

“WDCS hopes that this campaign, and the overt use of whales for dog food, will expose its scientific whaling programme as a politically motivated sham.”

Sue Lieberman, director of the global species programme for WWF-International, said: “This proves whaling is not about science at all. By promoting whale meat to schoolchildren they are seeking to create a new constituency that will support whaling in the future.”

Whale meat was a cheap source of protein that saved Japan from malnutrition after the Second World War, but tastes have changed and demand has slumped. Indeed, most older Japanese dislike whale meat precisely because of its association with cheap, hard-to-chew school dinners.

As a result, the country’s whale meat inventories are more than twice the size they were in 1999 and prices have tumbled by nearly a third. Once considered a rare delicacy, a kilo of whale steak can be bought at the Tsukiji fish market, in Tokyo, for about 2,500 yen (£12) — less than a similarly sized slab of Australian beef. This has led the Japan Whaling Association to publish a pamphlet, Scrumptious Whale, promoting whale meat as a food, and cookery magazines have been persauded to talk up whale meat recipes long rejected in normal Japanese homes.

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