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IKPIARJUK/ARCTIC BAY
The community of Arctic Bay, known for its stunning landscape and abundance of wildlife, is modelling its future tourism strategy on what is being used in Greenland.

Sport outfitter Damien Qaunaq of Maniituk Outfitting, right, takes a photo with a tourist and the polar bear they brought down during the 2009 hunting season. Arctic Bay is working on a new strategy for tourism that would support outfitters modelled after a system used in Greenland. - photo courtesy of Damien Qaunaq

The Ikpiarjuk Tourism Strategy will focus on creating a community-owned tourism business, which is how Greenland Tourism became successful in the late 1990s, otherwise known as the "Greenland Model."

The model's main objective is to create a company that will take over day-to-day business affairs such as marketing and accounting, and leave the guiding component to local outfitters.

Arctic Bay is the "only community in the Baffin region to launch a planned and co-ordinated approach to develop a community-based tourism strategy and implementation plan," stated the Ikpiarjuk Tourism Strategy document.

Arctic Bay economic development officer Clare Kines said it's crucial for the community to build back its tourism reputation following a few tumultuous years.

In 2007, the HTO banned filming at the community's floe edge after feeling negatively portrayed by a National Geographic film crew. The impact on the community's tourism industry was felt hard.

Then, in February 2011, Arctic Bay residents attended a public meeting where they were asked to vote on whether or not they wanted to attract more tourism to the area. The results were overwhelmingly telling - 143 residents voted in favor and only 23 voted against.

A year later, a consultant was brought in for a week and a tourism strategy was funded by Kakivak. The consultant, Paul Landry, proposed three delivery models - status quo, independent outfitters or a community-owned tourism company. There was strong support for the third one.

Kines said a business plan is still being put together, and funding applications have to be made.

"We're still trying to figure out a few things such as how to implement it and what structure it will have," he said. "We have the strategy in place, it's just a matter of getting the plan going."

The decision to model their tourism industry after Greenland's has been a few years in the making. For a while, the Arctic Bay HTO had a very successful business arm that took care of marketing and accounting issues.

Kines said the hamlet has extremely good outfitters who are best at what they do when they can focus on the guiding component alone.

"They're interesting, know how to point things out and they keep people safe and comfortable," he said.

"What we're looking at is having a central agency, or entity, that can look after developing tours, getting clients, and bringing them to the outfitters."

Some of the community's strengths outlined in the strategy document include floe-edge whale and polar bear viewing, nearby archeological sites, excellent hotel rooms and dining and an experienced tourism work force.

Kines cited the example of Churchill, Man., which is famous for polar bears viewings and tours.

"It wasn't done overnight," he said. "It takes a long time to get into people's consciousness, takes a lot of marketing. It's important to have someone doing that, who is able to develop products and attract people. We know this is something that won't happen overnight."

Glenn Cousins, a manager at Kakivak Association, said it was important to look at other success stories before going forward.

"To do something like this you need to look at other examples of where this has worked," he said.

"It requires a fairly comprehensive planning process that draws on the best practices of this type of initiative, say a community-owned tourism company. We need to find out what it will look like in terms of ownership, how the various parties are connected to the new venture, what the market opportunities are and how they will complement other tourism activities."

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