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November 5, 2004
Russia ratifies Kyoto accord
SIKU CIRCUMPOLAR NEWS
Russia’s parliament has ratified the Kyoto Protocol, an international agreement that’s intended to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and slow down global warming.
If Russian president Vladimir Putin approves the deal, it will come into force early next year.
Without Russia’s approval, the Kyoto Protocol, which has been rejected by the United States and Australia, can’t come into effect. It needs ratification by 55 industrialized nations that were responsible for producing at least 55 percent of greenhouse gas emissions in 1990.
Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia’s emissions are already 30 percent below what it produced in 1990.
According to the Kyoto Protocol, countries can trade greenhouse gas emission credits. Russia could also sell unused emissions credits to countries that have exceeded their limits.
Once the Kyoto Protocol takes effect, industrialized countries will have until 2012 to cut their emissions of six key greenhouse gases to 5.2 per cent below the 1990 level.
November 5, 2004
Kenai Peninsula preps for 2006 Arctic games
SIKU CIRCUMPOLAR NEWS
Observers from around the circumpolar world came to take a look at preparations for the 2006 Arctic Winter Games that are already underway in this Alaskan community.
The AWG international committee as well as the chefs de missions, who represent the athletes and cultural delegations, toured the games venues and met host society organizers.
The biggest challenge for the Kenai host society will be renovating the Kenai Multipurpose Facility for hockey games. Seating needs to be upgraded, dressing rooms built and heating installed for spectators.
The host society also needs to address the issue of transportation. Kenai lacks major public transit, so getting athletes and spectators around is going to be a major challenge.
The games, which will run from March 5 to 11, 2006, are expected to bring between 6,000 and 8,000 visitors and 2,000 athletes.
November 5, 2004
Jumbo squid head to Alaskan waters
SIKU CIRCUMPOLAR NEWS
Jumbo flying squid caught offshore from Sitka, Alaska show this species is now moving into northern waters.
Several of the five-foot Dosidicus gigas, or jumbo flying squid, were caught with a dip net by a fishing crew on Sept. 18 as they baited longline gear at night.
The farthest north the species has been reported until this year was off the coast of Oregon in 1997.
But since July, there have been seven additional reports of sightings of jumbo squid in waters from Oregon to Alaska.
Scientists are now curious to see if the squid are moving north due to increasingly warmer waters in the offshore region.
November 5, 2004
When dinosaurs roamed the Arctic
SIKU CIRCUMPOLAR NEWS
Picture giant lizards and T-Rex-like monsters: these are among the critters who once called the Arctic home.
Montreal-based paleontologist Hans Larsson recently revealed that in 2003, when he was on Bylot Island, he found pieces of giant foot bones from a huge creature resembling a meat-eating Tyrannosaurus Rex.
The reptile would have died about 70 million years ago.
Meanwhile, scientists in Norway say the Svalbard Islands are hiding thousands of giant prehistoric lizard fossils, dating from the Triassic Period, 210 to 220 million years ago.
At that time, these High Arctic islands were underwater, in a large, deep ocean with a black, muddy bottom rich in organic material. When the reptiles in the sea died, they sank to the bottom.
Over eons, the continental plates moved and the seabed was transformed into a thin layer of fossil-rich black shale.
November 5, 2004
Greenland hunters mourn quotas
SIKU CIRCUMPOLAR NEWS
Pavia Nielsen, a hunter from Uummannaq, came to Nuuk this week to talk about the impact of new limits on the traditional whale hunt in Greenland.
Earlier this year, researchers and international marine mammal management bodies said beluga numbers in West Greenland were down by half and that the population of narwhals there had declined to only 25 per cent of its original size.
The need for limits on the whale hunt was backed up by the Canadian-Greenlandic Commission on Narwhals and Belugas.
In response, Greenland’s department for fisheries and hunting set a 2004-05 quota for 300 belugas and 200 narwhals in western Greenland.
“The hunters have lost a lot, since the restriction on hunting beluga and narwhal hunt came into force,” said the hunter.
Nielsen came to Nuuk to make a speech at National Library, through a new project undertaken jointly by Inuit Circumpolar Conference Greenland, and KNAPK, the Greenlandic hunters and fishers organization.
“It´s really hard for hunters who haven’t got a quota,” Nielsen said. “You get depressed over that.”
Neilsen said he has lost a lot of his rights and he can’t provide for his family because he’s lost a major source of their income, although he still has his hunting equipment.
November 5, 2004
Finns drinking themselves to death
SIKU CIRCUMPOLAR NEWS
A record number of Finnish men died of diseases and poisonings caused by booze consumption last year.
According to Statistics Finland, in 2003, 1,283 men in Finland died from alcohol-related causes.
Over the past 20 years, alcohol-related deaths among men aged 45 to 69 have doubled.
Heart disease has long been the most common cause of death among Finnish men. Last year 1,356 died of the disease.
Alcohol-related deaths among women have also increased four times during the past two decades.
Last year, 267 women died from alcohol consumption. Alcohol-related deaths are more common among women than deaths from heart disease.
Meanwhile, the number of suicides in Finland has fallen to a record-low level. Last year, 687 men and 201 women took their own lives. This is the lowest level since the late 1960s.
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