The Arctic This Week Take Five: Weeks of September 20-27, 2021
Owners Granted Nearly 1 Million Euros to Preserve Old-Growth Boreal Forest in Arctic Finland
Commercial forestry group Utsjoen Porotilojen Yhteismetsä has received €900.000 to refrain from felling nearly 700 hectares of old forest in the municipality of Inari, in Lapland Finland, the Barents Observer reported September 22. The compensation is granted as part of a conservation scheme by the Finnish Ministry of the Environment, who has allocated €6 million from its budget of €20 million to be offered towards forest protection in northern Finland this year. The Finnish ‘freedom to roam’ act will not be affected by the decision, and people will still be able to hunt, fish and forage for berries and mushrooms in the new Tälvitupejävri-Talvitupajärvi conservation area. (The Barents Observer)
Take 1: Although this might seem like little more than a small – but welcome – win for local forest conservation, its implications are surprisingly diverse. The move to conserve the forest is celebrated by the local Sami Muddusjärvi reindeer cooperative. The decade-long dispute over the forest has been equally as much a struggle for the preservation of Indigenous culture and livelihoods, as for 200-year-old trees. Reindeer husbandry is only made possible here by the rich lichen fodder that carpets these old-forests. While the Boreal Forest is typically seen as an endless expanse of ever-green trees, in truth it bears a surprising natural diversity that is critical for supporting the over 600 Indigenous communities occupying the circumboreal region. This biodiversity is also crucial for carbon sequestration and has made the Boreal the latest front for climate change mitigation. However, this diversity is threatened; European tracts of the Boreal have been particularly severely degraded as a result of historical state management practices. Yet, this story indicates that the regeneration of natural diversity seen in Finnish forestry since the 1980s is ramping up. Importantly, the voluntary decision by Utsjoen Porotilojen Yhteismetsä to preserve the forest rather than continue commercial export is telling of a changing economic climate more favourable to Arctic conservation. With Finland also prioritising biodiversity in its upcoming chairmanship (2021-2023) of the Barents Council that includes Norway, Sweden, and Russia as its members, this can set an additional political incentive for these multidimensional victories to flourish across Nordic borders. (Frontiersin, Mongabay, Phys.org, Yale Environment 360)
Norwegian Space Agency to Launch Multinational Arctic Surveillance System
According to an exclusive interview with Andøya Space Defence on September 24, the primarily state-owned Norwegian aerospace company is collaborating on an observational platform that will offer complete real time ‘surveillance’ of the circumarctic region. The multinational collaboration between six Arctic nations, companies, and educational institutions, will see the development of the Integrated Remote Sensing in the Arctic (IRSA) environmental monitoring system consisting of space, air, ground, sea, and subsea-borne observational platforms alongside capacity for data analytics, including artificial intelligence. With completion aimed for next year, Andøya Space Defence will provide a comprehensive range of environmental data to governments, private companies, and educational institutions alike on commercial subscription. (High North News, IRSA Development Group)
Take 2: From the perspective of environmental monitoring, this project is a dream come true for the guarantee of real-time, high-quality data on a scale never-before seen. The massive spatial expanse and challenging logistics of the Arctic region have made remote sensing an essential tool in responding to the causes and effects of Arctic environmental change. This cutting-edge remote sensing technology is a far cry from the humble beginnings of Arctic monitoring, which saw icebergs daubed with motor oil in inventive but unsuccessful attempts to track their movements. However, the aims of this project are not described as environmental ‘monitoring,’ but of ‘surveillance.’ While this might be easily dismissed as an indistinguishable word-choice, there is a subtle -but important- distinction between the more innocuous connotations of the former and the loaded undertones of the latter. The project website suggests a project much more enmeshed within the military-industrial complex, and it is telling that this aspect is resolutely underplayed in the interview with HNN. Institute director Gunnar Jan Olsen carefully navigates the fine line between institutional knowledge and traditional intelligence, extolling the virtues of following fish stocks and oil spills in the same breath as tracking ‘dark targets’ for ‘big powers’. Norway is among several allied countries, including the U.S. publicly praising the scientific and social benefits provided by the revamping of Arctic remote sensing and communication infrastructure, but it is no coincidence that these developments are largely security-oriented in scope. With China and Russia pursuing space-based intelligence with equal ambition, a new kind of Arctic arms race might be brewing just over the horizon. (High North News, High North News, Mia Bennett, National Defense, Phys.org, Reuters, Viaplay)
Cluster of Industrial Mega-Cities to Connect Siberia with Russian Arctic
As covered by The Barents Observer on September 28, Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu revealed that discussions are taking place over a mega-development plan for Siberia. According to the interview with Russian media group RBK. the initiative includes a chain of five new major cities with populations of up to one million each. These cities are proposed to be the centres of new industrial and scientific clusters for natural resource extraction and processing while providing direct access to the Arctic Ocean. In development over the last decade, concrete plans on the macroregional development strategy are likely to be presented to the Russian government later this autumn. (Eye on the Arctic, RBC, The Barents Observer)
Take 3: Expecting the mass influx of highly-skilled citizens to a region historically condemned to exile and banishment may initially be dismissed as a foolish false hope. Plans and projects for the redevelopment of Siberia have resurfaced repeatedly since the Soviet-period, but none have stemmed its draining population. Bountiful mineral resources and vast industrial potential alone have not been able to compensate for the handicap of a near-inhospitable permafrost-bound environment that resists both agriculture and construction. However, the harsh Siberian conditions are softening with climate change, and the region is ironically posed to become among the most desirable destinations under current projections. These changes will also further ease access to the much-touted commercial benefits of the Northern Sea Route, to which this mega-city chain connects. The transitions speak to the need to unpack dominant framings of the Arctic as a vulnerable victim; climate change can be perceived as much of an opportunity to revitalize suspended Northern economies as an existential threat. However, this development plan is not merely an opportunistic leap of faith, but a highly calculated geopolitical move. Siberia’s strategic proximity to Asia is central to Russia’s investment in the area. Expanding Asian markets enable Russia to capitalize on growing demand to drive the region’s economic growth. At the same time, this bolstering can also be seen as a response to strategic anxieties over Chinese encroachment into Russia’s most insecure terrestrial and coastal fronts. With a ‘pivot to Asia’ implying the rejection of a redundant Eurasia, these construction moves have the potential to shift the building bricks of global significance. (Brookings Institute, Brookings Institute, CNBC, Grist, Russian International Affairs Council)
A-ha Returns with Arctic-Themed Project
As announced by state newspaper NRK on September 20, Norwegian band a-ha is developing a multimedia musical project inspired by Arctic nature. Titled ‘True North,’ the concert film is a collaboration between Bodø 2024 European Capital of Culture, Svømmehallen Scene, the Parken Festival and the Arctic Philharmonic Orchestra. Marking a-ha’s first return to music since the release of their reunion record in 2015, ‘True North’ is planned to be ready for release in early 2022. (High North News, NRK Troms and Finnmark, VG)
Take 4: 80’s pop fans are likely rejoicing at the news that the famed Oslo-formed band are returning once more to follow up their critically acclaimed 2015 comeback album “Cast in Steel.” Framed as a ‘melancholic tribute to the ocean and Arctic nature’, the project indicates the rising status of the Arctic in the current cultural zeitgeist, which has seen the environment the focus of star-studded productions and media headlines the last couple of years – a single mention of Disney’s Frozen is evidence enough of this claim alone! However, the enhancement of the global cultural presence of the Arctic through tropes of wilderness and isolation as employed here by a-ha might ironically be used to promote urban transformations on the ground. In 2020, the Norwegian government released their “High North Report,” detailing how advancing Northern development is geopolitically and economically critical for Norwegian interests, particularly in the face of a shrinking and aging population. Creating a more attractive destination through financial injections into local cultural scenes has been part of a strategic plan to shift the flow of people and money northwards. The projects conducted through Bodø as the European Capital City of Culture in 2024 are in particular seen as the launchpad for a Northern cultural renaissance. Considering the role of this collaboration with the most successful global pop music to have emerged from Norway from this strategic perspective flavours a-ha’s virtuous endeavours with a new layer of meaning. Culture and social perception undoubtedly play an underappreciated but critical role in Arctic security and development policy. (The Arctic Institute, Wikborg Rein)
United Kingdom Keen for Closer Military Cooperation with Canada in the Arctic
CBC News revealed on September 24 that Britain is interested in developing closer military ties with Canada in relation to their Arctic-facing activities. In the exclusive interview, General Sir Nick Carter, Britain’s chief of the defence staff, explained that the Royal Navy is eager to learn from Canada’s Arctic tactics by joining their cold-weather exercises. Britain has offered Canada the exclusive use of their nuclear-powered ice-breaker submarines in return. (CBC News, The Telegraph)
Take 5: Canada has largely flown under the radar of the Arctic security debate table that finds itself more typically preoccupied with the military grandstanding of the U.S., Norway, Russia, and increasingly, the self-declared “Near-Arctic State” of China. As demonstrated by this article, the U.K. is another Arctic ‘neighbour’ similarly keen to engage in the fray. However, in contrast to the observed militarisation of their fellow Arctic-adjacent countries, Canada is one of the few states that has instead decreased its military capacity in the last 70 years. Canada’s polite acknowledgment of the U.K.’s offer promises no binding commitment, demonstrating reluctance to allow anyone — even close allies — to operate in the region. This reluctance has largely to do with the fear that involvement with NATO will undermine Canadian sovereignty, a point of pride afforded by virtue of secure coastal geography historically buffered by American proximity. However, this aloofness might be leaving Canada out in the lurch with out-dated military technology. The recent exclusion from the recent AUKUS security pact sharing nuclear-powered submarines lends urgency to the U.K.’s proposal as a technology Canada lacks- but sorely needs. That the U.K. is extending its hand even as other countries turn away, indicates the value it places on Canada’s Arctic intelligence for strategic deliberations. However, for Britain, Canada is just one of many Arctic allies available. This should therefore be a wake-up call for Canada to confront its eroding strategic defence. The country has gotten by skating on thinning ice so far this century, but time might be running out. (High North News, The Conversation)