English Audio Request

World's race for economic growth threatens Greenland's pure white wilderness
The ancient way of life of polar Eskimos faces meltdown from the global population explosion and industrial pollution. Even environmentalists are part of the problem as they suppress a hunting culture
Part of the appeal of coming to the north of Greenland, I have no qualms in saying, was to discover the remnants of a way of life that might be labelled "exotic". However, it would be misleading to suggest that all the polar Eskimos here belong to a culture which could be called "hunter-gatherer". Nowadays, the majority of the people in Qaanaaq live as we do with more or less the same amenities. Seventy-two people own a hunting licence in the Thule region and most of those are part-time hunters.
The number of hunters travelling by dog-sledge across the frozen sea in search of sea mammals is therefore tiny and represents an insignificant threat to wildlife. Their traditional way of life is vanishing not because of global warming, but because the Self-Rule Government has caved in to the pressure and threats of environmentalist groups.
The polar Eskimos feel misunderstood, and it is not difficult to see why. Not unreasonably, they feel that environmentalists ought to focus on the world's major polluting countries which pose a real and significant threat, and not on small indigenous groups who live precariously and take the bare minimum from the land and the sea. The only people to exploit the riches of these Arctic seas were the European whalers of the 19th century who drove many species to the point of extinction. Arriving with their infectious epidemics, such as measles and influenza, they nearly wiped out the indigenous population, too.
Despairing about the prospects for hunting, some people have turned to Greenland halibut fishing instead. This seems like a sensible development and I am intrigued to see how good the ice fishing is here.