Climate change wreaking havoc on Canada's North

Canada.com ^ | December 3, 2005 | Ann Carroll

[Daralundy]

MONTREAL -- Take it from Jose Kusugak: climate change is turning life upside down for indigenous peoples in Canada's North.

Extreme weather shifts in the Arctic bring in their wake swarms of insects, treacherously thin ice floes and fast-spoiling food supplies, the Inuit community leader said Friday at the United Nations World Climate Change Conference.

"Many nations think of vulnerability and adaptation to climate change in the abstract -- we experience it," said Kusugak, president of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami.

The national association, which represents about 54,000 Inuit in four regions across Canada, Friday launched Unikkaaqatigiit: Putting the Human Face on Climate Change -- Perspectives from Inuit in Canada.

The study, available online at www.itk.ca, was conducted over four years in partnership with Laval University, the National Aboriginal Health Organization, Inuit land-claim organizations and 17 Inuit communities across the Arctic.

"If anyone knows about climate change, it's people who live their lives outside," said Kusugak, 55, who was born in Repulse Bay, Nunavut

Dramatic climate changes and their impact on everyday life are troubling for many traditionalists, he added.

"Unusual animals are appearing where I hunt. I'd rather not have these species in my hunting grounds,'' Naalak Nappaluk, 84, a Nunavik community elder who attended the UN conference to voice his concerns about climate change, said through an Inuktitut translator, citing lynx and a new variety of seal pups. "They are not good for the health of the existing animals, and disrupt the balance of nature."

Muctar Akumalik, 73, is perplexed by weather changes around his home in Arctic Bay, Nunavut.

"I used to be able to predict the weather, but now I often get it wrong," Akumalik said, through his translator.

[BereanBrain]

Boy, there's some REAL scientific evidence - a 74 year old man's recollections.....Hmmm let's see when I was a young whipper-snapper, Boy! did it get cold! and we had to walk uphill BOTH ways to school.....

Hey, and I thought DIVERSITY of wildlife was GOOD!

If this is the best the CHICKEN LITTLE crowd can come up with, they can't even make anyone scared! Come on, put a little mustard on that thing...throw something in about the abomible snow beast gonna get us if we don't stop being CAPITALISTS!

[Question_Assumptions]

And a few centuries ago, they could have interviewed Sven about how his family was suffering on Greenland because of the increseing cold.

[VOA]

If there is actually any pollution-based warming in the upper reaches,
one only need look at the change in the lifestyle of the inhabitants...
regular "European-style" housing, with heaters and electricity to
power the satellite TV, VCR, DVD, kitchen oven and appliances,
and most of the kids runnin' and a-gunnin' their three wheelers.
Not to mention all the passenger, truck and airline traffic that
was not a part of the scene until about 100 years ago.

Not to mention all the ecotourists that require plenty fossil fuels
to be burned so that they can get to paradises like ANWR...and back
to their digs in places like San Francisco or Santa Monica without needing to
really break any trail themselves!

[LibFreeOrDie]

So Canada is warming up, but Europe is getting colder (see recent articles: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1532467/posts )

Maybe the indigenous peoples of Canada can switch places with the Europeans...

[VOA]

Good reference:

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/flash/flash.html

(click on "Lost Vikings of Greenland" after the display settles down
and shows "Secrets of The Dead")

Bet that's one PBS product that NEVER gets shown in public schools...
Not because it will screw up the kids on the topic of global warming...
but also, IIRC, those Vikings were Christians.

[Justice]

Hey maybe now somebody can sell refrigerators to the Eskimos..

[ATOMIC_PUNK]

citing lynx and a new variety of seal pups. "They are not good for the health of the existing animals, and disrupt the balance of nature."

Climate change IS part of nature !

A new variety of seal pups ? what are their heads thicker so you gotta hit them twice as much to kill them ? and the lynx is stealing the dead pups before you can skin them ?

Man should adapt to nature were not changing it it changes itself as it grows and evolves we should to !

[festus]

launched Unikkaaqatigiit

Does it float ? Hardly sounds seaworthy to me.......

[Question_Assumptions]

On the flip side, during Colonial times, the Hudson River would freeze solid at Manhattan so you could walk to New Jersey. Climate changes. The earth has experienced both no ice at the poles and ice extending nearly to the equator. All without SUVs or humans.

[beaversmom]

One word: Bush

[The Foolkiller]

I sure wish we'd get some of that global warming in Ohio this winter. /sarc

[capt. norm]

Yeah....right.

An increase amounting to a fraction of one degree did all that.

By the way, the dog ate the rest of my homework.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Coming soon to the Eskimo community: Wal Mart.

[Mind-numbed Robot]

Tell the Inuits to just trade their mukluks for Bermuda shorts and flip flops. Life goes on.

[Jimmy Valentine]

Maybe now we can sell them refridgerators?

[Jimmy Valentine]

Jeeeezz! You beat me to it!

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the ping!