Stockholm, Sweden, May 23, 2001
Sheila Watt-Cloutier, President of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference (Canada) and Vice-President of Inuit Circumpolar Conference, and delegates of 110 countries took part in the signing ceremony today for the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs). Ms. Watt-Cloutier congratulated David Anderson, Canada’s Minister of the Environment on signing and ratifying the Convention. She urged all nations to follow suit to ensure the Convention enters into force speedily. “We must not allow countries to sit idle until this convention enters into force, Indigenous Peoples need the taps turned off. Even if we stop producing and using these chemicals now it will be many years before concentrations decline in our environment.”
Key POPs, including PCBs and DDT, are brought to the Arctic by air currents. POPs biaccumulate in the food web and in the bodies of Inuit and other northern aboriginal people who eat large quantities of traditional, “country food” particularly marine mammal fats. Ms. Watt-Cloutier noted, ‘this is not only an environmental issue, but to us it is a matter of public health and cultural protection. We already face many challenges in the Arctic, and the last thing we need to deal with is a threat to the integrity of our highly nutritious traditional food.”
Federal and territorial agencies and northern aboriginal peoples’ organizations have co-operated for ten years in the Northern Contaminants Programme (NCP) to research this issue. Data collected through the NCP features prominently in the 1997 State of the Arctic Environment Report published by the Arctic Monitoring Assessment Programme (AMAP) a constituent programme of the eight nation Arctic Council. She added, “With today’s signing, these programmes have proven their worth. The NCP and AMAP provided the scientific data needed to persuade the globe that international action was required.”
Four northern aboriginal peoples’ organizations Inuit Circumpolar Conference Canada, Inuit Tapirisat of Canada, Dene Nation, and the Council for Yukon First Nations formed a coalition to intervene in the global POPs negotiations sponsored by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). Preambular language in the convention singles out the Arctic and Indigenous Peoples, the first legally binding, global convention to do so.
“The Canadian negotiating team did a good job”, said Ms. Watt-Cloutier adding, “They listened to and acted upon the concerns of northern aboriginal peoples.” In particular, she praised the efforts of Dr. John Buccini, until recently a senior civil servant in the federal Department of the Environment. “John chaired the international negotiations with skill, diplomatic tact, and tenacity. He embodied the commitment and professionalism needed to persuade countries in all portions of the globe to conclude this convention”, and Klaus Topfer, Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme who “embraced the Arctic dimensions of this issue”.
For additional information contact:
Ms. Sheila Watt-Cloutier
President, ICC (Canada)
(613) 563-2642 or (867) 979-4661
Dr. Terry Fenge
(613) 722-7006
Ms. Stephanie Meakin
(613) 258-9471