Press Releases
25 August 2000 - Bowhead Whaling in Canada
The bowhead whale, also called the Greenland right whale, has for centuries been one of the most highly valued animals to Inuit people living in vast areas of Alaska, Canada, Greenland and Siberia.
In pre-modern times, the bones were important in house construction and the manufacture of various implements in a region where no trees grow and driftwood is scarce. Throughout the centuries, the nutritious meat, oil, and skin (called muktaaq or muktuk) has provided a high degree of food security in an environment where crops cannot be grown and food scarcity is not unknown.
The value of the oil and the baleen attracted European and American whalers, who also considered the bowhead a prized catch. From the middle of the 19th century, until oil and baleen markets collapsed early in the 20th century, large numbers of bowheads were killed and whale populations severely depleted as a result. After, the commercial whaling ended, the Inuit resumed their bowhead hunts, until the Canadian, Danish, and Russian governments stopped Inuit hunting of this depleted species.
However, in Canada, Inuit in the western Arctic continued to eat bowhead, because they maintained social and economic connections with their Alaskan relatives who were still allowed to hunt bowhead. Despite efforts in the 1960s to resume their own hunt, it was only in the 1990s that Inuit in the western Canadian Arctic resumed the hunt.
In the Eastern Canadian Arctic, apart from occasional whales hunted or found dead, the taste of the highly-esteemed bowhead mattak remained a memory only among older Inuit. The first bowhead hunting resumed in the mid-1990s, a time when Inuit reported bowhead numbers had been progressively increasing over two decades.
Bowhead hunting In Canada is regulated by co-management boards in the western and eastern Arctic territories. Management plans have been developed by the Inuit and approved by the Federal Government, and the hunt is under the control of the hunters and trappers organisation in the community requesting a hunt permit from the appropriate co-management board. Canada is no longer a member of the International Whaling Commission, so the hunt is subject only to conditions set down in federal and land claims agreements (the modern-day treaties). Bowhead hunting by Inuit is protected by specific acts of the Canadian parliament and Section 35 of the Canadian Constitution, as well as national whaling regulations contained in the Fisheries Act.
The bowhead, weighing up to 40 tonnes and the largest animal in the Arctic, is regarded with awe and reverence by the Inuit.
The time leading to the hunt is a periods of reflection and prayer, focused upon the safety of the whalers and the sacrifice of the whale. Ceremonialism, symbolism and celebration associated with bowhead whaling is greater than for other species of whale hunted by the Inuit, such that the return of bowheads to numbers allowing a limited resumption of this important activity aids the revitalisation of Inuit cultural traditions and sense of Inuit identity, especially among younger people.
The last bowhead hunt occurred in the summer of 1998; a bowhead hunt is planned by one Inuit community in the Eastern Arctic during the summer months in the year 2000.