Divide deepens on Nunavut polar bear management: minister

Nunavut's outgoing environment minister says he'sworried that Inuit hunters are losing faith in the territory's polar bear co-management system, with some even threatening to set their own quotas if hunting quotas are tightened.

"It's important that we send our message to the world that we are working together and that we are seriously managing our polar bears," Olayuk Akesuk told CBC News on Friday.

Nunavut manages its polar bears with a system based on both Western science and Inuit traditional knowledge, but the two sides have been at odds in recent years over the health of polar bear populations.

Some Inuit in the western Hudson Bay and Baffin Bay areas have been talking about setting their own quotas, also known as total allowable harvests, especially in light of concerns raised by territorial biologists about the Baffin Bay region.

Akesuk has recently accepted a recommendation by the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board to keep the current Baffin Bay quota at 105 polar bears this season.

Hunter threatens 'free hunting'

That came despite concerns by Environment Department officials about overhunting in Baffin Bay. They had wanted the quota also known as the total allowable harvest slashed to 64 bears or less this season.

Jayko Alooloo, chairman of the Mittimatalik Hunters and Trappers Association in Pond Inlet, told CBC News that he and other Baffin Bay hunters would start "free hunting like we used to [do]" if the territorial government or the wildlife management board actually does cut the polar bear quota there.

The polar bear co-management system in Nunavut has existed for decades, but it has set widely fluctuating polar bear hunting quotas in the past three years.

The quotas in 2005 increased almost everywhere in Nunavut, based on findings derived from Inuit traditional knowledge, also known as Inuit qaujimajatuqangit, that polar bear populations are growing.

But last year and this year, the quota was slashed significantly in the western Hudson Bay area, based on scientific knowledge that suggested polar bear numbers were in decline there.

Alooloo said he respects Nunavut's co-management system for polar bears, as long as it fully respects Inuit views.

Akesuk said the government is preparing to hold a wildlife symposium in the near future, to review the state of the polar bear co-management system and try to rebuild partnerships and trust between Inuit, government biologists and all others who are involved in setting hunting quotas.

"There's a lot of concern out there that our government is not doing their job, but we're doing our very best to make sure that our polar bears are stable in the future," Akesuk said.

"We want to work very closely with the communities that are affected by any research or any decrease or increase in total allowable harvest."