Hunting stats pave way for new wildlife quotas

GREG YOUNGER-LEWIS

Nunavut’s wildlife protectors have taken a major step in deciding how much Inuit hunters may harvest every year.

The Nunavut Wildlife Management Board has quietly released the long-awaited study, which will serve as a building block for setting limits on how many whale, seal, polar bear and caribou that hunters may kill every year, without endangering the animal populations.

But the comprehensive results, a whopping 822 pages of hunting statistics released earlier this month, are prone to error, by the authors’ own admission.

Even after eight years of preparation and spending more than $7 million, the Nunavut Wildlife Harvest Study doesn’t make final recommendations on the limits, which are an NWMB responsibility under the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement.

Jim Noble, CEO of the board, said researchers struggled to reach as many hunters as possible, but couldn’t convince everyone to participate, in part, because they were afraid the statistics would be used against them.

Noble said hunters in communities where fewer people participated in the study actually hurt themselves and their fellow Inuit, because it could result in the harvesting limit being set lower than it should be.

That means hunters could be cut off from harvesting some animals earlier than neccessary.

“Inuit should have wanted the best numbers they could get for Inuit use,” Noble said in an interview this week.

“You want that number as accurate as you can get it so Inuit can get that fair share of the harvest.”

The study compiles monthly interviews with 6,018 hunters from Nunavut’s 28 communities from 1996 to 2001.

Authors of the study claim that they reached almost all hunters in some communities, including Arctic Bay and Clyde River. But they were less successful in communities like Baker Lake and Coral Harbour, where response rates declined to about 64 per cent. Only about half of the hunters in Qikiqtarjuaq seemed to be participating in the final years of the study.

However, the study estimates it reached about 82 per cent of hunters registered with hunters and trappers organizations.

Besides participation problems, results are further skewed by hunters and fishermen who didn’t report everything they were catching, according to the study.

But not all under-reporting came from hunters afraid that high harvest numbers might lead to stiffer quotas in the future.

In Iqaluit, results from the first year were thrown out because the board had a difficult time keeping fieldworkers to conduct the study, citing challenges with the city’s “large and ever-changing population.”

In communities around Nunavut, some hunters and fishermen didn’t know they were supposed to report some harvest results. This occurred even when hunters felt comfortable speaking with local fieldworkers from regional wildlife boards, and hunters and trappers organizations. This omission touched some more abundant species like mussels, sculpin, arctic hare, and cod.

Fieldworkers goofed at times, such as telling hunters in Grise Fiord that they didn’t have to report quota animals, such as narwhal, polar bear and muskox.

Although some years proved more accurate than others, the study notes lower-than-expected harvest estimates in most communities, including Pond Inlet (for narwhal), Qikiqtarjuaq (caribou), and Resolute and Sanikiluaq (beluga).

The board will now compile their findings with federal and territorial statistics to come up with the numbers that will determine the basic needs levels of Inuit.

Basic needs levels describe the lowest level of harvesting Inuit need for food, clothing and cultural requirements. This number will dictate the percentage of the total allowable harvest that Inuit should be given, before sport and commercial hunters should be allowed to hunt.

Noble said the board hasn’t set a deadline for when they will establish the basic needs levels and total allowable harvest levels, which he says are determined by a formula in the land claim.