Seal hunt a 'way of life for Inuits'
A top Canadian Inuit official defended his country’s seal hunt today, saying it was vital to the survival of aboriginal peoples in the Arctic and provided an economic lifeline for an area desperate for jobs and growth.
Paul Okalik, premier of Canada’s northern Nunavut territory, said the majority of the 30,000 people in his territory were dependent on seals and other native species like the polar bear and fish for their everyday food.
“This is our daily basic diet, we can’t grow potatoes ... it’s something we require to continue to survive and its far more nutritious than what is imported from southern Canada,” Okalik told reporters.
“So we will continue to eat it, and assist our diets in living healthy; so you do your thing and we will continue to do ours.”
Canada’s annual seal hunt off its Atlantic eastern coast got underway last week amid renewed criticism from environmentalists and conservationists that the hunt remains cruel for the animals.
Okalik said however, unlike the East Coast sea hunt, the killing of seals in the north was year-round and was heavily relied upon.
“The species that we harvest is the ring seal, and it’s primarily adult ring seals,” said Okalik. “It’s not those fluffy cute things that you see on TV all the time, that these (conservation) groups use to try to kill the seal skin market.”
He said his government hoped to boost the trade in seal pelts, which he said would just be thrown away if there was not a market for them.
“At least with trade it allows us to use the whole seal, as opposed to just discarding the hide, which is a lot more valuable than cow hide,” said Okalik.
He said the Inuit way of life was threatened by global warming and he was in Brussels to speak with European Union officials to boost the profile of the problems of the Arctic region.
“We are seeing the effects of global climate change more predominantly in our territory,” said Okalik. “We’re getting shorter winters, longer summers and it’s creating a bit of a real challenge. We have a strong hunting and fishing society and each spring and autumn we see quite a bit of tragedies where people fall through the ice, or lose their equipment and it’s creating a real challenge for our search and rescue capacity, for example.”
He said that the rise in temperatures was also having major effects on wildlife like the polar bear, which relies on sea ice to hunt its prey.
“We require an international action to tackle it,” Okalik said. He called on the EU, Canada and other Arctic nations like Russia to focus on practical measures to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide, blamed for global warming.
He said his territorial government was already investing in alternative energy sources, away from fossil fuels, like more environmentally friendly sources like hydro electricity and wind power generation.
Canadian fisheries officials and sealers say the annual hunt provides badly needed income for the isolated fishing communities in Atlantic Canada, as well as food and shelter for the aboriginal Inuits in the Arctic North.
