Whitney Angell Leonard, Wildlife Advocate, Livingston, Montana

The Canadian government, which manages two thirds of the world’s polar bear population, claims its management framework “ensure[s] the sustainability of Polar Bear populations in Canada.” But if the Canadian government is so committed to polar bear conservation, why are provincial governments paying hunters for polar bear hides, fueling the market for these prized pelts?

That is exactly what happens in Canada every hunting season, as the government of the Northwest Territories hands out cash up-front for polar bear hides that will later be brought to auction. What’s more, the Northwest Territories Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment recently announced that they are increasing the price they will pay to $1,750, up from the $400 they offered last year. The move is intended to give hunters another option besides selling their hides to taxidermists at low prices, but nonetheless, it doesn’t exactly send the message that polar bear conservation is a top priority.

Polar bears are protected under national law and international treaty, so Canada’s polar bears can only be harvested by Inuit hunters for subsistence, or by sport hunters guided by Inuit. Subsistence hunting allows the Inuit to carry on their cultural traditions and to provide for themselves in traditional ways, so most communities reserve a large portion of their polar bear quota for their own subsistence hunt, rather than selling them to sport hunters. This is often cited as evidence that the Inuit value traditional subsistence hunting more than the money they would make selling their tags and guiding sport hunters.

But when the government pre-pays hunters for the hides of bears shot in this subsistence hunt, and then sells the hides at auction for up to $11,000 (which also goes to the hunter), it blurs the line between a subsistence hunt and a commercial hunt.

Prices for polar bear hides have risen astronomically in the past several years, with last year’s record high prices already exceeded at an auction this January. As long as it is legal to sell polar bear hides on the international market, as it is with the polar bear’s current status under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), these rising prices will continue to push Canada’s subsistence hunt toward a commercialized, market-driven hunt.

The Northwest Territories pelt payment program may be well intentioned, an effort to make sure hunters receive their fair share of the prices being paid for polar bear pelts at auction, but it has the unintended effect of commercializing the subsistence hunt.

We support a true subsistence hunt and believe that Canada needs to invest in First Nations communities. But what we’re seeing now – using provincial dollars to increase the economic incentives for harvesting an endangered species – is not the right answer.

Please join us in taking action to help protect polar bears by clicking here, or become an NRDC “Den Defender” by clicking here.

Photo credit: em_j_bishop on Flickr via CreativeCommons.org.