WWF warns of global boycotts over Baffin Bay polar bear hunt quota

The World Wildlife Fund is condemning Nunavut for maintaining its polar bear hunt quota in the Baffin Bay area, warning that boycotts may follow the decision.

CBC News revealed this week that Environment Minister Olayuk Akesuk accepted a recommendation from the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board not to change this season's polar bear quota for the Baffin Bay area, despite concerns from government officials about overhunting.

"This is an unfortunate, huge mistake of global significance," Peter Ewins, conservation director with World Wildlife Fund Canada, told CBC News on Wednesday.

"There will be major global pressure on Inuit and Canada and Nunavut to reverse the decision, to actually get serious about taking measures to recover and conserve polar bears."

This year's quota in Baffin Bay — an area between northern Baffin Island and Greenland — will remain at 105 polar bears. Nunavut environment officials have wanted the quota to be reduced to 64 bears or less.

While the officials have said the Baffin Bay quota is too high as it is, with overhunting from hunters in both Nunavut and Greenland, the government deferred any decision to change the quota until next year.

Officials told CBC News that Akesuk agreed to keep the quota unchanged partly due to concerns from area hunters, and partly because of the amount of time it took for the wildlife board to make a decision on whether to change the quota.

Polar bear numbers rising, hunters insist

Lootie Toomasie, chairman of the Nattivak Hunters and Trappers Association in the Baffin Bay community of Qikiqtarjuaq, insisted that the number of polar bears is actually rising in the area.

"We live with them and we see them, so we are the first people who should be making [a] decision," Toomasie said.

"Those people somewhere down south, they don't know. They only see the numbers on the paper."

But the WWF disagrees, saying it wants Jim Prentice, the new federal environment minister, to work out a solution between Inuit hunters, the Nunavut government and Greenland.

Ewins said it's clear that the combined polar bear hunt by Nunavut and Greenland hunters in Baffin Bay is too high, and that's bound to provoke a reaction in Europe.

"I don't think it will be many months before … the European Union and most European countries will close off the importation of any polar bear parts [or trophies] to Europe," he said, pointing to similar bans on seal products in some European nations.

"It's unaccountable, indefensible, and it simply has to be reversed before Nunavut and Canada is subject to yet more boycotts."