Climate-change campaign misrepresents Inuit, says critic
Last Updated: Friday, April 20, 2007 | 1:18 PM CT
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An expedition across Baffin Island designed to raise awareness about climate change has one Iqaluit man raising concern that it's also creating a false impression of Inuit culture and the Arctic environment.
Global Warming 101, which has been travelling by dogsled from Iqaluit to Igloolik since Feb. 14, has attracted a lot of media attention in the United States.
Iqaluit resident Ben Kovic, currently president of the Baffin Fisheries Coalition, pointed to a recent American report on the expedition that said Inuit traditional knowledge is becoming obsolete.
"Come on, we are still functioning. We are still Inuit," Kovic said. "We're going to function another 5,000 years. Whether global warming is here or not, we're going to adapt to the new world, whatever it is going to be."
Kovic said Thursday that while he doesn't deny the impact climate change is having on Inuit, he worries that some recent coverage of the event may give southerners the impression that Inuit are not capable of adapting to change.
Kovic also took issue with media coverage that said Inuit hunters are falling through thin ice and dying.
"We're not all dying. There have been some accidents, even before the global warming ever came to be," he said. "This is a continuation of natural hunting tragedies."
American adventurer and expedition leader Will Steger contacted Kovic late Thursday to discuss his concerns. Steger told CBC News that he will include more input from Inuit and elders on the expedition's website.
"But I think the important thing is since we have media here coming up, we want to represent," Steger said. "If we are doing something not representing properly, we want to be corrected."
Theo Ikkummaq of Igloolik, one of several Inuit hunters on the Global Warming 101 trip, said he wants people to know that Inuit need to prepare for the ways climate change could affect their culture down the road.
"We feel that people can still adapt to this change. Our culture is still relevant, even though it's changing this much," he said. "But my question is, 40 years down the road, will it be the same?"
As of April 13, the eight-member expedition team had reached Clyde River, having travelled 1,026 kilometres of its approximately 1,900-kilometre journey, according to the team's website.
During the four-month trip, the team of four Inuit and four Americans are stopping in communities along its route to interview local people about the changes they are seeing because of the warming climate.
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