Iqaluit beluga hunters fear quota

SARA MINOGUE

The federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans is reviewing the five-year trial period of a community-based management plan for beluga in Iqaluit and Kimmirut that will expire on March 30, 2005, at a time when the management plan does not appear to be running smoothly.

The current agreement – between DFO, the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board and the Amarok and Mayukalik hunters and trappers associations – sets no beluga quotas, but makes the HTOs responsible for ensuring hunters report belugas that are landed or struck and lost.

This year, only six kills were reported in Iqaluit through this system.

After hearing the reported numbers, DFO spoke to the Amarok HTO, which agreed that 27 was a closer approximation of actual kills. That number is significantly lower than the five-year annual average of 38.

No estimates were made of the number of animals that were struck and lost.

“We put a lot of effort into accurate reporting and we’re not getting the information that’s required,” said Karen Ditz, a fisheries management biologist with DFO in Iqaluit. “I think it’s fair to say that the accuracy of what’s being submitted doesn’t suit the needs of responsible management.”

Section 5.3.3 of the Nunavut Land Claim Agreement says that DFO can restrict or limit harvesting if there is a valid conservation concern.

A report produced by the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife this spring said that six out of seven beluga populations in the Canadian Arctic are at risk of extinction. That suggests that the south-east Baffin beluga stock is also at risk, but nobody knows for sure.

That’s because belugas in Frobisher Bay appear to be migrating animals that come from several areas, rather than a single stock that can be monitored and counted.

For the past five years, the DFO has asked hunters to take samples of landed whales so they can analyze the genetic makeup of the animals to determine where they come from. So far, no unique genetic signature for belugas in Frobisher Bay has been found.

Without concrete numbers, the DFO cannot argue that belugas are at risk, and cannot impose a quota, as was done with the Cumberland Sound beluga population, where hunters were allowed to take only 41 belugas last year.

For that reason alone it’s surprising that the DFO is not more sensitive to its new role as assistant and partner to the HTO and the NWMB, rather than as enforcers from the era before the land claim, when DFO had the power to impose a quota on whales in Frobisher Bay.

Recommendations on whether to renew or amend the current agreement will not be made public until at least February, but a DFO employee may have inadvertently given a sneak preview of what’s to come at the Amarok HTO’s annual general meeting in Iqaluit last Tuesday.

About 100 hunters were gathered in the Parish Hall on Dec. 7 to discuss the beluga hunting rules – a three-page document printed in English only – that forms the backbone of the community-based management plan.

The rules were originally drafted by the HTO in 1999, and were amended by the NWMB and DFO. The HTO must vote to accept the rules every year before they come into effect.

Martine Giangioppi, a fisheries management technician with DFO in Iqaluit, spoke at the meeting.

“We recently did a review tour on community-based management,” she said. “The main issue, it seems, is that a lot of people don’t follow the rules, and some don’t even know the rules.”

Giangioppi then told the hunters that a working group is about to make recommendations to the NWMB on whether to continue with the current plan.

“The rules have to be followed,” she said. “I’m just giving you a little tip here.”

Giangioppi also said she had heard reports of meat being wasted. The rules clearly state that all edible parts of a beluga should be used.

Several hunters did not take kindly to these remarks, and many made impassioned and eloquent speeches about the right to harvest country food.

“Right now, it seems that the hunters are not really responsible for the activities here,” said Joe Tikivik. “We know for sure that there is no meat being wasted.”

“So DFO consulted elders,” said Johnny Mike. “Have they been given authority by the elders to deal with this issue? That doesn’t make any sense.

“I’m saying this as loud as I can – I don’t want to see the old quota system back in place.”

Sytukie Joamie, a former chairman of the HTO, reminded the members to be distrustful of DFO.

“Be aware of the fact that Inuit in Nunavik were told by DFO to work together, and afterwards were told they could not harvest any whales,” he said.

Madeleine Redfern, a student with the Akitsuraq law program at Nunavut Arctic College, read from notes when she rose to speak.

“I’m a little concerned with DFO’s approach. You came across as very threatening when you said that… if hunters continue not to report, a quota’s going to be imposed,” Redfern said

“I am not a beluga hunter but I do take hunting and harvesting rights very seriously, and those rights are being extinguished.”

Giangioppi later apologized, and said she even felt sick after seeing how her comments were received, but she was interrupted by two hunters who heckled her in Inuktitut.

But Ditz, who later acted as a spokeswoman for the DFO, was firm on their position.

“One of the things that has to happen is that individuals need to take responsibility,” Ditz said. “If they want to have control over their resources, they need to take responsibility for it. That makes perfect sense, I think, and that is the essence of community based management in the land claim.”