****************** A SIMPLE REQUEST ****************** Many of our files are unique and/or copyrighted by The Center For World Indigenous Studies and The Fourth World Documentation Project. All FWDP files may be reproduced for electronic transfer or posting on computer networks and bulletin boards provided that: 1. All text remains unaltered. 2. No profit is made from such transfer. 3. Full credit is given to the author(s) and the Fourth World Documentation Project. 4. This banner is included in the document if being used as a file on a BBS, FTP site or other file archive. Thank you for your cooperation. John Burrows Executive Director Center For World Indigenous Studies ()-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=() ||/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\|| ||=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-|| || || || The Fourth World Documentation Project runs entirely on grants || || and private donations. If you find this information service || || useful to you in any way, please consider making a donation to || || help keep it running. CWIS is a non-profit [U.S. 501(c)(3)] || || organization. All donations are completely tax deductible. || || Donations may be made to: || || || || The Center For World Indigenous Studies || || ATTN: FWDP || || P.O. Box 2574 || || Olympia, Washington USA || || 98507-2574 || || Thank You, || || CWIS Staff || || || ||=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-|| ||\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/|| ()=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-() ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: :: This file has been created under the loving care of :: :: -= THE FOURTH WORLD DOCUMENTATION PROJECT =- :: :: A service provided by :: :: The Center For World Indigenous Studies :: :: :: :: THE FOURTH WORLD DOCUMENTATION PROJECT ARCHIVES :: :: http://www.halcyon.com/FWDP/fwdp.html :: :: THE CENTER FOR WORLD INDIGENOUS STUDIES :: :: http://www.halcyon.com/FWDP/cwisinfo.html :: ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: DOCUMENT: CLIMATE2.TXT INUIT PERSPECTIVES ON CLIMATE CHANGE Statement by Rosemarie Kuptana, President of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference to the Second Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Geneva 16-19 July 1996 My name is Rosemarie Kuptana and I originally come from Sachs Harbour, a small Inuit village on the Beaufort Sea in the far western part of the Canadian Arctic. As President of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, an international organization that has existed for fifteen years, I speak on behalf of the Inuit nation living in the Arctic regions of four circumpolar countries - Russia, Alaska, U.S.A., Canada and Greenland. First I want to thank you for this opportunity to speak, and to thank the Sierra Club for the tremendous support they have provided to get me to this meeting. My thanks also to the Climate Action Network for their support. It is an honour to speak to this important Ministerial meeting on climate change. Global climate change is another external factor, like transboundary pollutants, that is changing our Arctic homelands with potentially disastrous consequences. I will address some global issues of climate change as well as the potential impacts of climate change for the Arctic and sub-arctic regions in which my people live. The principal goals of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference include the development and promotion of long-term policies to safeguard the Arctic environment. For example, the ICC was very actively involved in the discussions leading to the adoption by the 1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development of Agenda 21, including Chapter 26 on Indigenous Peoples. Since that time, ICC has been very actively involved in the development of regional, national and international environmental protection strategies for the Arctic. I am here to speak on behalf of a people who have lived intimately with the Arctic environment for tens of thousands of years. Inuit are a hunting people who live primarily by the sea and at the ice edge. We depend on land and marine mammals, on fish and other Arctic renewable resources for food and other necessities. Inuit culture and our traditional lifestyles are closely adapted to the natural rhythms and processes of the Arctic climate and environment. The traditional knowledge of my people is a vast storehouse of information gathered over many thousands of years. In addition to our natural dependence on the Arctic environment for food, my people have a deep and spiritual relationship with the land, sea, ice, animals and climate of the Arctic as it is today. The Arctic that we know has shaped our culture in ways too numerous to mention. It has made us who we are -- Inuit, people of the Arctic. Climate change has not gone unnoticed at the community level in the Arctic. Today, our hunters are noticing changes in our homeland -- such as discolourations and thinning of sea ice, changes in the leads and open water areas, and the presence of animals not previously found in our region. For the first time in Inuit memory, grizzly bears have been sited near my home community on Banks Island. Highly experienced and knowledgeable hunters have had experiences falling through areas of sea-ice they have previously known to be safe. In addition to the knowledge of our hunters and elders, scientific knowledge confirms that climate change as it affects the Arctic is a serious issue. Science tells us of much higher rates of warming in many parts of the Arctic than the global average, thawing of permafrost and sea-ice and increases in sea level. There is increasing evidence that changes in the Arctic are often greater than average global changes. The arctic ecosystem and the societies dependent on that ecosystem are, in many ways, more sensitive to climate change than other parts of the world. Scientists have identified a number of reasons to explain this special sensitivity of the Arctic which I won't go into here. But science suggests that for any given warming of the planet's surface, the expected change of temperature in the Arctic in many regions is 2 to 2 1/2 times the global average. The overall conclusion to be drawn from scientific and traditional knowledge is that climate change is likely to have dramatic and very few, if any, positive impacts in the Arctic. Inuit believe that global climate change in all its aspects is an urgent problem affecting the welfare of all peoples and all societies. What we know about global climate change dictates that we take urgent and timely global action. As Ministers, you are gathered here to debate the meaning of the latest scientific assessment of climate change. For Inuit, there is no debate. Climate change is happening, and the projected climate change, in the absence of strong, immediate and ongoing mitigating measures, is dangerous. I must tell you that for our sake, as well as yours, human induced climate change must be stopped. We cannot wait for the year 2010 or 2020. As a global human family, our fates are linked to one another, just as they are linked to the fate of our planet. As a global human family, we must -- by 1997 -- determine specific targets and timetables for reductions in greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere. There is one year left to negotiate next steps for the Convention on Climate Change -- One year to negotiate a legally binding protocol that includes serious targets and timetables for greenhouse gas emission reductions. One year left to take real steps to avoid dangerous interference with the climate system. Waiting is not acceptable. Your science can not tell you how fast climate change will happen and your science can not tell you what and when the surprises will be -- just that they will happen. Your science is revealing more and more risks. Those risks are unacceptable to Inuit. Those risks should be unacceptable to all of the peoples represented here. I call on all governments at this Second Conference of the Parties to consider the fate of the Arctic and the impacts your lifestyles are having on us. We need you to instruct your negotiators that climate change is dangerous and that it must be avoided. Greenhouse gases must be cut so that a doubling of their concentrations in the atmosphere does not happen. We have the technology. We have the alternatives. We need the political will. How you respond to our recommendations for action will tell us whether you are serious about addressing climate change and whether there is room for Inuit perspectives in the development of your actions plans. I wish to make the following recommendations to this Conference: First, to adequately address the climate change problem by 2100, we must begin setting targets and timetables for greenhouse gas reductions for the intervening period. Our first target and timetable must be a 20% reduction by 2005 to be signed at the Third Conference of the Parties meeting in Japan in 1997. I would like to note that there have been some impressive efforts in Japan to raise public understanding about how industrialized nations are affecting the Arctic (through transboundary pollutants for example). I am sure we can count on Japan for similar leadership on the issue of climate change. Second, the importance of the traditional ecological knowledge of Indigenous Peoples and the importance of our participation must be recognized. Indigenous Peoples must be recognized as an integral part of any international process aimed at addressing climate change issues, including the process leading to the Third Conference of the Parties. The principles of Chapter 26 of the Agenda 21 require that the United Nations respect indigenous knowledge systems as much as western science. Chapter 26 requires that the UN incorporate indigenous knowledge and participation in your future action plans. And in case you need one more reason to include us -- the stated goal of the United Nations Decade of Indigenous Peoples (1994-2004) explicitly includes the strengthening of international cooperation for the solution of problems faced by Indigenous People in such areas as the environment and development. We are not asking you to make new commitments but to respect existing ones by acting on them. Such action must include public education and communication measures designed by, and for, indigenous peoples. Inuit have practiced sustainable development for thousands of years. However, climate change threatens our ability to practice sustainability and to survive and flourish as an Arctic people. The Arctic climate is harsh, and to others, it may seem unappealing. But you must realize that the Arctic climate is an integral part of a sensitive ecosystem; and that that ecosystem has nourished us and all the generations that have gone before. We must ensure that it will feed our children and the generations to follow. You must also realize that our unique Arctic ecosystem has shaped our culture, our minds and our spirit as Inuit. Climate change in the Arctic does not mean exciting new opportunities for Inuit -- to start farming, for example, instead of hunting for our food. We know enough from the science of climate change and our own knowledge system, that however the Arctic might change under a pattern of continuing climate change, it will still be unique. At best, a new Arctic climate would require the development of a whole new set of skills to earn a livelihood from. But it is far from clear that there would be time to discover and develop those skills. At worst, it would be impossible. Inuit have survived and flourished in the Arctic by the development of skills, by adaptations made over thousands of years. Climate change is occurring at a much faster rate, and it is possible that a profound disruption in traditional lifestyle and livelihoods could occur within two generations. If action is not taken now, current patterns of climate change carry potentially disastrous consequences for my people. That is why we, as Inuit, can not afford to wait for action in the decades to come. We need you to act now, because the risks of climate change for the Arctic and the world are not ones we can afford to accept. Thank you. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Wendy Moss Special Assistant to the President Inuit Circumpolar Conference 170 Laurier Ave. W., Suite 500 Ottawa, Ontario K1P 5V5 tel: (613) 563-4967 fax: (613) 563-0740 -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- To have a current Center For World Indigenous Studies Publication Catalogue sent to you via e-mail, send a request to jburrows@halcyon.com http://www.halcyon.com/FWDP/cwiscat.html Center For World Indigenous Studies P.O. Box 2574 Olympia, WA U.S.A. 98507-2574 FAX: 360-956-1087 OCR Provided by Caere Corporation's OmniPage Professional