Economic aftermath

Researcher responds to Humane Society International – International Fund for Animal Welfare report on polar bear trade.

The HSI-IFAW authors are correct that Inuit receive barely one-half of sport hunt fees, citing my figure of $1.5-million as this annual revenue, but then question the importance of sport hunt money to Inuit.

I derived the economic effect from the value of the traditional food produced for each sport-hunt dollar Inuit “invested” in hunting equipment. The result was a 5:1 return.

Polar bear sport-hunting, as an economic activity, took off in the aftermath of the collapse of the world sealskin market, an occurrence in which the International Fund for Animal Welfare played a primary role.

Inuit card

Federal government accused of using Inuit for political gain, which would be totally unprecedented.

Sheryl Fink, the director of the Canadian seal campaign for the International Fund for Animal Welfare, notes that as far back as 2001, a Foreign Affairs e-mail talked about playing “the Nunavut Inuit card as leverage” in trade negotiations.

“We know they’re trying to play up this Inuit thing and portray all commercial hunting in Canada as Inuit hunting,” she said, describing the non-aboriginal hunt as much larger and more wasteful. “It is frustrating for us when we see lines getting blurred between the two because it is a deliberate tactic on the part of the government.”

Seal suit

Inuit groups seek to overturn EU ban on seal products with lawsuit.

“It is important for Inuit across the Davis Strait to unite and fight this unethical legislation,” said Aqqaluk Lynge, president of ICC (Greenland) in a news release.

“On top of the climate change issue, we must contend with animal rights extremists who fundamentally do not respect our way of life, and who use disinformation to further their cause at our expense.”

ITK president Mary Simon said the European ban smacks of racism and hypocracy.

“It is bitterly ironic that the EU, which seems entirely at home with promoting massive levels of agri-business and the raising and slaughtering of animals in highly industrialized conditions, seeks to preach some kind of selective elevated morality to Inuit,” she said.