Climate Change is Changing Lives!
By: Jasmine
People being Affected
The Arctic is beautiful and many different religious people and a large variety of plants. Almost 30 different peoples with unique cultures and traditions call the Arctic and tundra regions home. The Indigenous Peoples that live there in the Arctic, which are mostly Inuit, live in the coldest regions of North America, Eurasia and Greenland.
What they need to survive
Many people who live in Nunavut live by hunting, fishing and gathering resources to support themselves and the local economy in their communities. Local hunting games have already changed and new technologies are increasingly relied upon.
Transportation
Moving Around
Some traditional travel routes are now unable to be used, stopping the use of camp sites. According to many elders and community members,the less amount water creates a problem for traveling by boats more difficult . The early melt of lakes, rivers and sea ice make travel routes unsafe in the spring which would cause shipping and hunting problems.
Shipping Problems
Decreasing sea ice thickness and cover will open areas of land and water that have been inaccessible. This will lead to more shipping and industrial activities. While a longer summer shipping season will create more money-making opportunities for Nunavut, it will also increase pollution to the environment, as well as more unwanted oil spills in the ocean.
Transportation Challenges
Other transportation-related challenges have been noticed. For example, sea ice changes the traditional snowmobile or dog team transportation routes. New or alternate routes will be needed to continue safe traditional hunting and recreational activities.
Fight the Changes and Challenges that Climate Change Creates
In survive against these challenges and changes, Nunavut will need improved research and better technology.This refers to better systems. Improved infrastructure will likely include paved roads and new marine structures in coastal areas.
Food Security
Change
Climate change makes less access to wildlife and more safety risks from changes in sea ice thickness and distribution, permafrost conditions and extreme weather events. This may change traditional food security.
Bad Meat
Food storage is also affected by warmer temperatures and melting ice. Some talking with elders suggest that outdoor meat storages, which are used to keep meat fresh and preserved in the cold, will get warming, creating the meat to spoil.
Unhealthy Food
Country food is still the healthiest food choice for Nunavummiut. However, climate change may increase human food to contaminants. A shifting climate can change air and water currents that bring contaminants into the Arctic.Also, changes in ice cover and thawing permafrost appear to have contributed to increased mercury levels in some northern lakes. This results in more contaminants making their way into plants, animals, and ultimately humans.
Hunter's Fears
Talks with them
“Talk to hunters across the North and they will tell you the same story, the weather is increasingly unpredictable. The look and feel of the land is different. The sea-ice is changing. Hunters are having difficulty navigating and travelling safely. We have even lost experienced hunters through the ice in areas that, traditionally, were safe. The melting of our glaciers in summer is now such that it is dangerous for us to get to many of our traditional hunting and harvesting places,” says Watt-Cloudier. By Grid-Adrenal and ICC (Inuit Circumpolar Conference)
Food they eat
“For generations uncounted, Inuit have observed the environment and have accurately predicted the weather enabling them to travel safely on the sea-ice and hunt seals, whales, walrus, and polar bears. Inuit do not hunt for sport or recreation. Hunters put food on the table. People further south on the globe go to the supermarket, Inuit go on the sea-ice. Eating what Inuit hunt is at the very core of what it means to be Inuit. When they can no longer hunt what is on the sea-ice their entire existence as a people is threatened,” Watt-Cloudier points out.
Importance of Sea ice
“It is very important to get good sea ice, it provides us with the means to travel and hunt, usually for 6 months of the year”,stated by a women named Caitlyn Baikie who had lived in the Arctic all her life.