Reykjavik - Iceland's outgoing fisheries minister has angered conservationists after announcing a hike of the North Atlantic nation's whaling quota.

The five-year quota to 2013 amounted to 150 fin whales and 100 minke whales a year, the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society (WDCS) said Wednesday.

Iceland angered conservationists in 2006 when the government said it would resume commercial whaling and set a quota of nine fin whales and 30 minke whales, of which six fin whales were caught.

"It is a sad day for whales that they now become the latest potential victims of the world economic crisis and we have not seen a hunt of this scale in the North Atlantic since the 1980s," Sue Fisher of WDCS International said.

The quota increase was announced in a brief statement by Fisheries Minister Einar K Gudfinnsson of the Independence Party.

The ministry statement said the quota "will be according to scientific recommendations."

The conservationist group noted that the quota may however be revised since the grand coalition formed 2007 between Gudfinnsson's party and the Social Democratic Alliance collapsed this week.

The current financial crisis has severely impacted the North Atlantic nation of some 320,000 people. The economy is facing severe contraction and unemployment is due to rise sharply.

The president has given the Social Democrats the task of forming an interim minority government before early elections are held.

The fin whale is the second largest of the seven great whales. They are up to 24 metres long, and can weigh between 45 and 64 tons. The World Conservation Union
(IUCN) has listed the fin whales on its red list of threatened species.

Minke whales are the smallest of the seven great whales. They are up to 11 metres long, and can weigh about 8 tons. (dpa)