Thank you for that warm welcome, and for inviting me to ArcticNet’s Student Day.  

 

Before I begin my remarks, I want to acknowledge all of you in the audience who work so hard at creating a body of Arctic research that can contribute to Canada’s decision making on improving the well-being of Inuit, and protecting the health of our Arctic homeland, Inuit Nunaat.

 

ArcticNet has grown to become a world-class climate change research program because of your continued commitment to Arctic research. On behalf of Arctic Net and on behalf of Inuit I want to thank you for this commitment.

 

Also, in our audience today is a large delegation of International and Canadian Inuit and I want to thank you for taking to time to travel here this week and contribute your knowledge to this important event.

 

Finally, I want to recognize and welcome our Nunavut Sivuniksavut students from Nunavut, and other Inuit youth from across Inuit Nunaat.  You can be the future of Arctic research so I am delighted that you are participating in this historic research event.

 

I say ‘historic’ because all of you are participants in a unprecedented event – the largest and most diverse, international, Arctic research conference ever held in Canada, and your focus is on ‘Arctic change’.

 

I know that for many of you, your research has centred on the rapid, climate related changes that are occurring in the Arctic and the vulnerability of Inuit and our ecosystems to this change. 

 

The information you are collecting through your research is essential to the decisions that Canada must take in ensuring the necessary resources are in place to help Inuit adapt to their rapidly changing conditions. As we look toward 2012 when the first phase of the UN Kyoto Protocol expires, your work in Arctic science must shape what a new post-2012 Protocol should look like.

 

In thinking about today’s talk, I decided against describing in detail the impact that climate change is having on the lives of Inuit, because I know that many of you, if not all of you, in this room study these issues, or live these changes, on a daily basis.

 

You have seen, first hand, how rapid climate change in the Arctic has affected the permafrost, and our communities which are built on the permafrost. You have witnessed how climate change is accelerating the erosion of our coasts, causing floods and introducing insects that Inuit have never seen before.

 

This morning I would like to broaden the discussion of your theme ‘Arctic Change’ by taking a few moments to talk about the context for your current research.

 

As President of Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami I have the privilege and honour to represent Inuit at extraordinary events across Canada, and I can tell you that I have attended many events this year that have signaled the promise of ‘change’ - good change.

 

This has been a remarkable year for Canadian Inuit, and there is a momentum of change in the air. Let me give you a few examples.  

 

This year Canadian Inuit witnessed Royal Assent of the fifth and final regional Inuit land claims agreement in Nunavik, northern Quebec. Meanwhile, the Inuit of Nunatsiavut have just elected a new government. The great chain of regional Inuit land claims agreements and governments now stretch, unbroken from the Alaska border to the Atlantic Ocean, this is what we call Inuit Nunaat.

 

Like the three other Inuit regions in Canada, the people of Nunatsiavut now have the tools to make laws and allocate resources and to create education systems that honour our knowledge and cultural heritage, honour our language and graduate our children, some of whom will be tomorrow’s scientists. 

 

In June of this year, I stood before our Prime Minister Stephen Harper to accept on behalf of all Canadians his Apology to Inuit survivors of the residential school system. I told the Prime Minister that the Apology meant that a “new day had dawned” for “building a new relationship with Inuit”. And I sincerely believe this – that the Apology marks the beginning of a new period of education policy for Inuit – that will be far more successful in unlocking the potential of our young people to graduate as lawyers, and as doctors and as scientists.  

 

Of course I have to mention two other remarkable events for Inuit this year. Canada has its first Inuk Federal Minister of Health – Leona Aglukkaq, who was formerly Nunavut’s Minister of Finance and Minister of Health.

 

And Canada’s First Minister’s table will now include an Inuk woman, the new Premier from the new Nunavut Territory – Eva Aariak, who was formerly Nunavut’s Language Commissioner.

 

To think that Canada now has, as it’s Minister of Health, someone who was born, less than 40 years ago, in an outpost camp at Thom Bay along the Arctic Coast, speaking Inuktitut as her first language, sends an extraordinary message to our young people, that Inuit have every right and opportunity to stand alongside other Canadians in the highest offices in our land.

 

I mention all of these events because the science of the Arctic is inextricably linked to the well-being of Inuit, and the well-being of Inuit begins with unlocking our human potential through our education systems, and through investments in knowledge collection and learning opportunities, such as ArcticNet. 

 

Breakthroughs in governance such as in Nunatsiavut, unprecedented achievements in our political life that Inuit have witnessed this year, and the historical shifts in policy such as the promise of a new era in education from the Prime Minister’s Apology, all of these events contribute to our ‘collective consciousness’ of a new level of possibilities for Inuit..and we must take full advantage of this momentum, across all disciplines including Arctic science.

 

If Canadian Inuit are at the threshold of a new era of nation building, as I believe they are,  then what should that look like in Arctic science? 

 

Well, I would be most interested in hearing from you on what you believe next level should be.

 

I believe, that the next threshold in Arctic science must involve pushing, to unprecedented levels, the legitimacy and value of Inuit knowledge in Arctic research.

 

It wasn’t many years ago that the notion of collecting Inuit knowledge in the context of Arctic research was absent from research conversations.

 

But thanks to the efforts of organizations such as the Inuit Circumpolar Council as well as ITK, coupled with the innovative methodologies of certain scientists and researchers, we started setting new standards of engagement of Inuit in research, and in the incorporation of Inuit knowledge.

 

But engaging Inuit in research is not ‘a project’, it is a continuum, with the goal being arriving at a day when Inuit research scientists work alongside their non-Inuit colleagues in collecting data. All of us, scientists, policy makers, leaders must continue to make decisions that get us closer to that goal.

 

To our existing research community I challenge you to re-examine your approaches to Arctic research, and consider whether your methodologies need to
be re-conceptualized and raised to a new level of collaboration and partnership with Inuit.

 

All too often Inuit knowledge is still being viewed as a commodity, harvested narrowly and indiscriminately, failing to recognize that the Inuit community is complex, and consists of wide cultural and linguistic variations and a inter-connected worldview.

 

Undoubtedly you have already discovered that for Inuit a conversation on climate change takes a broad, holistic view that touches on the inter-connections between our environment, our politics (particularly in area of sovereignty)  and our social, economic and cultural well-being. 

 

In my view, by working in close partnership with Inuit, ArcticNet can be the leaders in expanding the social and humanities side of its world class science. By encouraging the wide collection of information and data that will help our communities prepare for the impacts of climate change.

 

I believe there are new thresholds of validating Inuit knowledge that we must reach for and it is up to the research community and the policy makers, in other words, up to you, to push those boundaries, introduce innovation, and communicate your results so that others in the research community can be brought along this continuum.

 

It is also up to the research community to push, to new levels, the involvement and development of our Inuit youth in research initiatives, not simply as field hands, but as part of your project goal of fostering a new generation of Inuit scientists.

 

And this is where our challenge comes in as Inuit. To the students in this audience I want to say this, If Arctic research is going to embody true change, and be pushed to its next level of achievement and legitimacy, it must involve your  generation, pushing Inuit scholarship to whole new level.

 

Inuit need your energy, and your motivation, to push to new thresholds, the number of Inuit researchers and scientists who can lead their field of research, and strengthen the role of Inuit in the collection of knowledge that will help us understand our changing environment. 

 

ArcticNet must also continue to play an important role in this process. Through the leadership of ArcticNet, collaborations with all levels of government and Inuit organizations must be forged, to create opportunities for our young people to experience research and science and be part of that bigger picture of fostering a new generation of Inuit scientists.

 

Earlier this year, ITK sponsored an Education Summit, where we had the opportunity to see a presentation by a Maori education specialist from New Zealand. In her presentation she spoke of the Government of New Zealand’s investment in a Research Centre of Excellence that has made it possible for over 2000 Maori scholars, community members and international academics to engage in new research, publish the results of this research and contribute to the overall knowledge about Maori.

 

Through its strategic investment the New Zealand government ‘seeded’ its next generation of Maori scholars. Imagine if we could do this in Canada for Inuit scholarship and Inuit science!

 

I believe that Inuit are standing at the threshold of what can only be described as an extraordinary rebuilding era for Inuit that will define a new narrative for Inuit…and the foundation of that rebuilding process will be the collection, application and validation of Inuit knowledge.  

 

I invite all of you to make a contribution to this era – through innovations in how your research projects are designed to reflect the inter-connectedness of the Inuit worldview, through new levels of innovation in how knowledge and data is collected in the Arctic, and through constructively involving our young people in your research and exciting them on how important your data can be in the decisions that affect the well-being of Inuit.

 

To our young people, I challenge you to take up the torch of the unprecedented opportunities that are available to you to participate in Arctic research and science. As future scientists or future leaders in your communities, you hold the keys to pushing the validation of Inuit knowledge along the continuum toward a day when Inuit scientists stand alongside their colleagues in the pursuit of knowledge.

 

Thank you again for asking me to speak at this meeting.

 

I am honoured to have spoken to an audience of so many people who care deeply about the future of the Arctic and our people. 

 

Nakurmiik.