North Slave Metis Alliance demand Nunavut ban on Bathurst caribou
Dwindling herd is facing extinction says organzation's president
Kassina Ryder
Northern News Services
Monday, June 6, 2016
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
The North Slave Metis Alliance is calling on the Nunavut government to enforce a full-scale hunting ban on the Bathurst caribou herd.
"The North Slave Metis Alliance, and I think I speak for the other aboriginal organizations in the Northwest Territories, are disappointed that the Nunavut government has not respected a 100 per cent harvesting ban on the Bathurst caribou herd," said Bill Enge, president of North Slave Metis Alliance. "They've been issuing harvesting cards for commercial harvesting purposes, which we find absurd."
The Nunavut Government is proposing a total allowable harvest of 30 male caribou, said Jason Akearok, executive director of the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board (NWMB).
Meanwhile, the NWT's Wek'eezhii Renewable Resources Board (WRRB) is recommending a total harvesting ban on the herd until 2019. Population surveys conducted in 2015 found that the number of breeding females had plummeted by 50 per cent since 2012.
The herd had an estimated 15,935 breeding females in 2012, but that number had dropped to an estimated 8,075 by 2015.
The survey also found that the herd's total population had suffered a 40 per cent drop in only three years, from 34,690 animals in 2013 to an estimated 19,769 animals in 2015.
Those numbers reflect a 96 per cent decrease in population since 1986, when the herd consisted of about 470,000 animals.
The WRRB initiated a ban on commercial and resident hunting in 2010, said Grant Pryznyk, the board's chair. Under the ban aboriginal hunters were permitted to hunt 15 animals for ceremonial purposes.
"The board took a lot of consideration of everything going on over the years, starting in 2010 with the resident hunt being shut down and the commercial tags and the outfitters," he said. "This is just the next step in that entire process because aboriginal people are always the last ones to have their harvesting curtailed."
A variety of factors are contributing to the herd's decline, such as poor breeding rates and environmental concerns, Pryznyk said.
"It's hard to tell which ones are having what impact, the level of impact of each one," he said. "All we know is the herd is continuing to decline and there are numerous factors that are playing into it."
Public meetings to discuss the herd are scheduled to take place in Cambridge Bay, Nunavut from June 14 to June 17 and will include representatives from management boards, the Government of Nunavut and the GNWT, as well as hunters and trappers organizations and the public, Akearok said.
Information gathered at the public hearings will guide the NWMB's decision, which is expected to be announced in the fall.
"At that in-person hearing, the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board will be considering evidence, listening to the hearing parties and asking questions," Akearok said. "We'll be making a decision, we anticipate, in September."
The decision will then be presented to Nunavut's minister of Environment and Natural Resources, who can then accept or reject the decision.
"If it's rejected, it comes back to the board for reconsideration," Akearok said.
The hearings will also discuss the Bluenose East caribou herd, which is also spread across the two territories.
Pryznyk said the NWT ban could officially come into effect in the fall.
"Hopefully, it's going to be some time before the start of the fall harvesting season because most of the harvesting takes place starting in the winter when the caribou come back down here," he said.
However, aboriginal groups in the territory have already volunteered to avoid hunting Bathurst caribou, he added.
"The Tlicho government has indicated their people won't be harvesting caribou," he said.
Enge said the NSMA hasn't hunted the herd since 2010, even though they were permitted to harvest for ceremonial purposes.
"The North Slave Metis have never requested any of the 15," he said. "We believe that a 100 per cent harvesting ban needs to be in place."
Enge said a total ban is now key to the herd's survival.
"The herd has been decimated to the point where it's facing extinction," he said. "The need for a harvesting ban is critical and we see that as a legitimate and necessary action by the Government of the Northwest Territories, along with all the other aboriginal governments that are involved in determining the future of that herd."
