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Narwhal harvest plan under scrutiny

Community-based or DFO quotas?

Kerry McCluskey
Northern News Services

Iqaluit (Feb 11/02) - Officials will gather in Iqaluit today to discuss the fate of a three-year community-based wildlife management pilot project.

Ben Kovic, chair of the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board, said stakeholders in the ground-breaking narwhal harvest management system will evaluate the last three years.

Officials from board, Nunavut Tunngavik, the Department of Fisheries and Oceans and regional wildlife organizations were scheduled to participate. "We don't have much time," said Kovic Friday morning.

The narwhal harvest begins in spring. A decision about how the harvest will be managed must be made before the hunt begins. "We have to review the cases and go from there. It's still in the planning stages," he said.

Community-based narwhal management came about in 1997 with the formation of the Narwhal Working Group, which replaced quotas set by DFO with a local management, non-quota regime overseen by community associations.

The federal minister approved the plan and the communities harvesting the most narwhals had the opportunity to pass a series of bylaws and regulations within their HTAs.

Repulse Bay, Pond Inlet and Qikiqtarjuaq all adopted the system in 1998 and introduced the new system the next year. Arctic Bay and Kugaaruk joined last year. Over-harvesting took place in some communities -- a thriving narwhal tusk market exists -- but community managers say the kinks have been ironed out.

Kovic said interested parties need to choose between continuing with community-based management or reverting to government quotas. If the new system is chosen, he said communities will need to educate hunters about community-based management. "We have to learn how to properly harvest these animals. It's not an opportunity to take as much as you can," he said.

And, even though Kovic said DFO called the project a dead issue at the board's quarterly meeting in January, stakeholders want to review the successes and failures of the project before making a decision.