 The scale of whale harvesting decreased substantially after 1946 when , in response to the steep decline in whale populations , the International Whaling Commission placed a moratorium which set a catch limit for each country ; this excluded aboriginal groups up until 2004 . As of 2015 , aboriginal communities are allowed to take 280 bowhead whales off of Alaska and two from the western coast of Greenland , 620 gray whales off of Washington state , three common minke whales off of the eastern coast of Greenland and 178 on their western coast , 10 fin whales from the west coast of Greenland , nine humpback whales from the west coast of Greenland and 20 off of St. Vincent and the Grenadines each year . Several species that were commercially exploited have rebounded in numbers ; for example , Grey whales may be as numerous as they were prior to harvesting , but the North Atlantic population is functionally extinct . Conversely , the North Atlantic right whale was extirpated from much of its former range , which stretched across the North Atlantic , and only remains in small fragments along the coast of Canada , Greenland , and is considered functionally extinct along the European coastline . 
