by Glenn Taylor
Northern News Services

INUVIK (Sep 26/97) - Federal Fisheries Minister David Anderson says he will continue to support Inuvialuit hunting of bowhead whales, despite continued opposition to the hunt by the International Whaling Commission.

Anderson was in town last week en route to an Arctic scientific expedition. While in town, he met with Gwich'in, Inuvialuit and Sahtu resource management officials to hear their concerns about the department.

The only major issue that surfaced, and has continued to surface, is whaling, he said.

Canada dropped out of the commission in 1982 over concerns from aboriginal groups, the Inuvialuit included, that the commission might hinder subsistence hunting, according to Anderson.

As long as the Inuvialuit Regional Corporation and other land claim groups object to joining the commission, the government will remain on the sidelines as an observer only, he said. Whaling is "an aboriginal entitlement," said Anderson.

The commission opposes the hunt primarily because Canada is not a member of the body, and as such is considered something of a lone renegade.

The United States threatened a boycott of Canadian fish products in 1992, when the Inuvialuit were given approval to launch their first bowhead hunt in decades. The boycott fizzled, but the U.S. and other members of the commission still oppose the hunt.

Anderson said he also supports hunting of the Eastern Arctic bowhead herd by Nunavut, despite concerns that the herd there, unlike the Western Arctic herd, is perilously close to the brink of extinction.

Very little research has been undertaken on the Eastern Arctic bowhead herd, but some scientists say the population might be as low as 250 to 1,000 whale, about three per cent of its pre-whaling levels last century.

Anderson agreed that "it would be nice to have more information (on the herd)," but he said, given the population estimates he'd been given, "I think we're OK ... Right now, I do not see a situation where conservation is needed, and where we'd have to say no" to whaling.

With Ottawa's fiscal balance sheet much improved this year, Anderson said he plans to press his cabinet colleagues for more money to increase research on species under his protection.

"I've raised the question of the importance of scientific inquiry" with cabinet, he said. "We don't have enough (information)."