Greenland native hunters keep hunting narwhals, and they are apparently hunting too many.
To be clear, it's the Greenland population that's in trouble; according to the article, there are an estimated 120,000 narwhals globally (which means the Arctic).
"Greenland’s government introduced quotas for hunting narwhal for the first time in 2004, and also banned the lucrative export of their tusks. Narwhal meat is now the hunters’ most commercially prized product, and is distributed around the country from the hunting districts to be sold in Facebook groups and supermarkets, where it can fetch 500 Danish kroner (£57) a kilo.
Yet, despite hunting restrictions, populations are plummeting, according to surveys by the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources, a government advisory body that monitors the environment. In 2008, surveys estimated there were about 1,900 narwhals in Ittoqqortoormiit, the main hunting location in east Greenland. At the last count in the area, in 2016, the population was put at about 400.
Scientists estimate that today the three hunting sites in the east – Ittoqqortoormiit, Tasiilaq and Kangerlussuaq fjord – have no more than 600 narwhals combined."
No comments:
Post a Comment