The RCMP wants to build a criminal intelligence network in Canada's Arctic, as it says organized crime groups are already established in the northern territories.

Officials with the national police force say the presence of drug and other crime networks will only grow stronger, once future mines and other resource development projects bring more money into remote northern communities.

"We expect organized crime to take advantage," Chief Supt. Pierre Perron, the RCMP's director of criminal intelligence, told CBC News.

"If you need cocaine, you're going to have a network to bring it into the country and then eventually to Iqaluit."

A decline in sea ice on the Northwest Passage, which could mean more marine traffic in Arctic waterways, could also mean more opportunities for organized crime groups to operate north of 60, he added.

Currently, there is only one full-time criminal intelligence officer serving all of Canada's three territories.

Call for 30 intelligence officers

As part of a proposal to bolster the RCMP's criminal intelligence resources nationwide, Perron is calling for up to 30 new intelligence officers to be based in the North.

"To say that we have no capacity in the North is not necessarily true, because every officer we do have does operate in some capacity as an intelligence officer," he said.

"However, we would like to implement dedicated criminal intelligence officers."

Perron said his case for more intelligence officers has been submitted to the RCMP's senior management, but said the current economic recession has slowed down progress.

Nunavut Justice Minister Keith Peterson said he knows criminal networks operate in the territory. However, he said bringing criminal intelligence officers north is not his priority.

"I'm more concerned, as minister of justice, [with] responding to the request for nine administrative positions in the nine [RCMP] detachments across Nunavut," he said.

Peterson said police administrators can handle calls and paperwork, freeing up officers in the process.

The minister has also asked the RCMP to recruit 32 Inuit special constables over the next five years.