Nunavimmiut like their country food and home

For Inuit across Canada, country food goes hand-in-hand with community well-being, says a recently-released Statistics Canada study.

But jobs would make life even better and enable younger Inuit to hunt and fish.

That’s the overview of a report called “Harvesting and Community well-being among Inuit in the Canadian Arctic.” The report analyzes part of the information collected during Statistics Canada’s 2001 Aboriginal Peoples Survey. It draws on interviews with more than 10,000 Inuit men, women and children in 53 communities in the Nunatsiavut, Nunavik, Nunavut and the Inuvialuit regions.

“The historical tie that Inuit have had to the land remains strong today. Overall, seven in 10 Inuit adults were involved in harvesting and harvested meat and fish remained important good sources,” says the report.

The report says more Inuit women than men harvest country food, and that the men who are hunting or fishing are more likely to be middle-aged: “the higher cost of equipment and supplies required to harvest (rifles, boats, snowmobiles, gas etc.) may have contributed to the lower percentage of young Inuit harvesters.”

But country food still accounts for at least half of the diet of two in three families.

Nunavik is tops with respect to the amount of country food people eat: about eight in 10 Inuit households say at least half the meat and fish they eat is country food.

And children in Nunavik are also the most likely to eat fish or seafood, with three in 10 eating some five days a week. Nearly half of all children in Nunavik, Nunavut, and the Inuvialuit region still eat “wild meat” five to seven times a week.

Nunatsiavut has the lowest rate of country food consumption among the Inuit regions and the lowest level of satisfaction with the freshness of store-bought foods.

Almost all Inuit still share food: nine in 10 households say they share food, creating a kind of mixed economy based on traditional and non-traditional foods.

In Nunavut, the country food market alone is worth $40 million, according to an estimate from the Canadian Arctic Resources Committee. The report cites the high prices of store-bought food in the Inuit regions, where four items, potatoes, milk, beef and flour, costing $31.22 in Clyde River and $23.33 in Kuujjuaq, cost only $9.47 in Ottawa.

Inuit prefer to stay in their home communities, the report finds, with more than two in three people still living in the same community they were born in.

For Nunavimmiut, there’s no place like home, and less than one in five have even thought about leaving their community, although in the other regions the rate of Inuit who have considered moving is much higher.

The close link between Inuit and their communities is shown by the high rates of volunteerism and voter participation — which is double that in Toronto.

The prospect of a better job is the main reason for thinking of leaving, says the report.

The largest problem facing communities is unemployment — at least, that’s what seven in 10 in Nunavik and eight in 10 in Nunavut say. Alcohol and drug abuse and suicide are also seen as major problems.

About half of all Inuit adults say “more jobs” would help improve living conditions, and the need for jobs was identified as the “top area for improvement” in all regions.

Only one in three say they are satisfied with the job opportunities in their communities. The level of satisfaction is highest in the Inuvialuit region — where oil development has brought many jobs, followed by Nunavik, Labrador and Nunavut.

Housing followed as an area needing improvement. Less than half of Inuit adults are satisfied with their housing.

The 2001 survey was conducted across Canada and covered a wide variety of topics, including education, labour, health, housing, communications technology, language and mobility. In addition, aboriginal peoples in the Arctic were asked some questions about harvesting activities, personal and community wellness and social participation.
A new Statistics Canada census is underway in communities across Nunavut and Nunavik.