Is sustainable resource utilisation a relevant concept in Avanersuaq? The walrus case

Abstract

This article addresses the role of Atlantic walrus (Odobenus rosmarus rosmarus) in present-day Avanersuaq from anthropological and biological perspectives, and asks whether or not sustainable resource utilisation is a useful concept in northwest Greenland. We describe the relations that unfold around walrus and walrus hunting, in the communities living adjacent to the North Water polynya on the eastern side of Smith Sound. We examine the interplay of walrus population abundance, hunting practices, uses, and formal (governmental) and informal (traditional) ways of regulating the hunt, and we analyse how walruses acquire multiple values as they circulate in different networks. Sustainable resource utilisation, we conclude, is a concept that is relevant in Avanersuaq and beyond, because it works as a biological standard, and hence organises laws, norms, and practices of formal management. Simultaneously, the term is problematic, because it ignores manifold levels of human and societal values connected to walrus.

Life around the North Water ecosystem: Natural and social drivers of change over a millennium

“…With a present purchase price of up to 65 USD/kg and yield of on average 120 kg of skin per whale it is the most highly priced of all hunting products. As demonstrated above, when trade in fox skin ended, and when the international market for seal-skin had collapsed in the 1980s (Andersen et al 2018), the narwhal became the game of highest commercial importance. Like the trade in fox fur did, the emergence of a market for narwhal mattak (skin and blubber) increased the monetary income among good hunters mostly on the Greenlandic market (see Fig.…”

“…A specific Thule-law was made in 1929, on the initiative of Knud Rasmussen, the owner of the station (see also Andersen et al 2018). With this law, a hunters’ council was established with three representatives from among the hunters, from the North, the South, and the Middle district respectively, in addition to the residing doctor, the station manager, and the priest.…”

Thule as Frontier

“…In the Thule region, the unintentionality of the design follows directly from the human dependence on living resources that must be protected and shared, but cannot be formally governed. Even sustainability becomes a contested concept in this resource landscape as has recently been thoroughly discussed on the basis of anthropological and biological observations and analysis (Andersen et al 2018). Interestingly, the Thule hunters now claim to have actually invented the notion of sustainability.…”

Using ecosystem‐services assessments to determine trade‐offs in ecosystem‐based management of marine mammals

“…Beaumont et al 2007]) rather than spatially transient and culturally significant populations of marine fauna. With the exception of a partial review by Roman et al (2014) and indirect or unpublished descriptions (e.g., NAMMCO 2017; Riisager-Pedersen 2017; Andersen et al 2018;Hammerschlag et al 2019), no comprehensive description and classification of marine mammal ecosystem services has been presented relevant to their management.…”

“…(2014) and indirect or unpublished descriptions (e.g., NAMMCO 2017; Riisager‐Pedersen 2017; Andersen et al. 2018; Hammerschlag et al. 2019), no comprehensive description and classification of marine mammal ecosystem services has been presented relevant to their management.…”