Canadians Want Exception in Endangered Act

U.S. ban on bringing home bear pelts could devastate Canada's Arctic villages.

ByABC News
June 25, 2008, 11:49 AM

June 26, 2008 — -- A group of Canadian officials traveled to Washington this week to make an unusual plea: They asked the United States to allow the import of polar bear hides, which became illegal when the animal was declared "threatened" by the U.S. Deparment of the Interior on May 14.

The request is being made on behalf of at least four Inuit communities in the Arctic region of Canada, whose economy depends on the lucrative polar bear hunting season.

If American hunters are not allowed to bring back the pelts of bears they kill, Canadian officials fear they will stop coming to the country to hunt the bruins.

"We want to express our concern about interests that were interfering with our natural resources," said Bob McLeod, minister of industry, tourism and investment for the Northwest Territories, who is on the team currently in Washington. "This will virtually wipe out hunting in the Northwest Territories."

Since American hunters account for an estimated 60 to 75 percent of polar bear hunters in northern Canada, it is believed that more than 85 people will lose their jobs, and far more will feel the ripple effect caused by the loss of this $1.6 million industry, McLeod said.

The decision to place polar bears under the protection of the Endangered Species Act came in response to the continued "loss of sea ice," the bear's natural habitat, that would put them "at risk of becoming endangered in the foreseeable future," according to a statement by the Department of the Interior on May 14.

There is no mention that the danger to polar bears stems from hunting.

In the same statement, Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne specifically noted that "limiting the unintended harm to the society and economy of the United States" was a concern.

What did not seem to be a priority, however, was the harm to the economy in Arctic Canada, home to about two-thirds of the world's polar bear population, which is estimated at 20,000 to 25,000.

"In our view, sports hunting has no effect on the polar bear population," McLeod said. "Most of the population is well managed. The sport is very closely monitored and sustainable."