May 5

Jose Kusugak, President, Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami
http://www.itk.ca/

Jose Kusugak told participants that he had recently celebrated his 55th birthday, to give them a reference point for comparison. “I was born in an igloo in Repulse Bay, May 2nd,” he said, noting that years later in Ottawa it was 25oC on the same day.”

Though it is hard to imagine life back then, “you can assume that we lived outside every day and all day except to sleep,” said Kusugak. “We lived as part of the arctic ecosystem.” Inuit were taught about their environment—the sky, land, and water—and “it wasn’t that difficult to understand since we lived in it.”

Kusugak compared the stupidity of dinosaurs who destroyed their environment in 25 million years to that of humans who in his lifetime have done the same thing. “We’ve destroyed the atmosphere to the point where I don’t know when to take my holidays,” said Kusugak, explaining that due to changing climate, he does not know when go North to hunt caribou or to fish.

He said that he was asked to speak about the response and adaptation of Inuit to the impacts of climate change. “In one sentence, it is reality; it’s happening.” Kusugak related community reports of “simik” (one of the kinds of snow) disappearing and also of good water sources disappearing.

He told participants of the recent tragedy of two young men drowning on their way back to Cape Dorset after one had located the other (who was lost) using GPS technology. Thinking he could use the same instrument to return home, they left the safety of a cabin for the sea ice. The problem was that, where there is normally no floe edge at that time of year, there was then.

While technology is wonderful, “it doesn’t improve your mind,” said Kusugak, noting that it all comes down to the fact that “you have to care; don’t just think of number one.” When Kusugak thinks about his childhood during which he knew two white people—the priest and the Hudson’s Bay Company trader—he would have found it impossible to imagine that 50 years later he would talking to a room full of them. Similarly, he cannot imagine what the future will be like for his grand- and great-grandchildren. He envisions, for example, that the Northwest Passage will be navigable and bring with it all the problems of drug and human trade and pollution.

“We have to care and have to encourage our leaders to care for future generations,” said Kusugak. This is the “only way to make a dent in mitigation and adaptation for climate change impacts.”

2005-04-05