Ottawa adds wildlife-rich Arctic bay in N.W.T. to list of protected areas

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Darnley Bay is home to about 40,000 beluga whales, as well as bowheads, abundant seals and fish such as cod and Arctic char. Egg Island hosts large seabird colonies and polar bears stalk the winter sea ice.    

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The protected area, to be known as Anguniaqvia niqiqyuam, covers about 2,400 square kilometres and has been under consideration for protection since 2009. Its new status rules out oil and gas exploration, commercial shipping and commercial fishing.

“We really applaud this,” said Chris Debicki of The Pew Charitable Trusts’ Oceans North Canada.

Debicki praised the government’s extensive use of traditional knowledge and the fact the bay is near a community.

“It’s connecting a protected area with people,” he said. 

“That’s something we may not have seen in past generations of conservation in the Arctic, where there was an emphasis on protecting areas that we determined as pristine and occupied our imaginations as places untouched by humans, which was really a fiction.”

Nakimayak said he and his family eat food taken from the bay on a daily basis. He also praised the government’s work with the community.

“That is very good, I tell you. It’s very good the way they co-operate with us. I hope they continue.”

The most recent federal budget allocated $124 million over five years to support marine conservation activities, which include designating new protected areas.

The World Wildlife Fund says about one per cent of Canada’s oceans and great lakes are protected — far short of international commitments to protect 10 per cent by 2020.

For Nakimayak, Darnley Bay’s new status protects a way of life that has sustained his people for centuries.

“That’s how we survived before stores. I live off the land. I’m happy and I love it.”

— Follow Bob Weber on Twitter at @row1960

Bob Weber, The Canadian Press

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