By Karolina Kuprecht and Torsten Diesel (Inuit Heritage Trust)
The research project “Certified Trade with Indigenous Peoples” was devoted to the question: How can a voluntary certification system contribute to fairer sustainable trade with Indigenous peoples?
Our goals were to establish a self-regulated certification system and then put the system into practice with a label for certified products from Indigenous peoples to be traded into European trade channels. The project received positive and critical feedback at the IPinCH Cultural Commodification workshop in Vancouver in May 2013.
After the workshop, we made the ambitious decision to focus the project on seal products from the Inuit, the Indigenous peoples of Arctic North America. In Canada, the trade of sealskins into European markets once changed the lives of Inuit. It afforded a cash resource to Inuit families that fit into Inuit subsistence practice, and helped to modernise the seal hunt. Seals were and are hunted for food, and income from sealskins was used for rifles, motorized boats, and snowmobiles. The Inuit sealskin economies, however, lasted for only a short time. Vigorous animal welfare campaigns launched worldwide against the arguably inhumane killing of seals by hunters on the east coast of Canada highly affected the sealskin trade. Thirty-four countries, including the United States, Russia, as well as the European Union, implemented trade bans for sealskin products. The international trade of sealskins collapsed.
What led us to develop our project with a focus on Inuit sealskins was the legal exception made for Inuit in the Seal Ban Regulation of the European Union. The regulation refers to the 2007 UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and exempted Inuit seal products from the trade ban. In trade law, such consideration of Indigenous interests is unique and practically unexplored.
In addition, Switzerland—even though located in the middle of the European Union—is not part of the European Union, and it does not have a legal seal ban in place. Switzerland thus seemed to be the right place to start the project.
Although the seal ban of the European Union offers an exemption for seal skins harvested by Inuit, Canadian Inuit do not actually benefit from this clause. In addition to several other reasons, particularly related to Canadian federal politics, according to Terry Audla, the president of the national Canadian Inuit organization Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami (ITK), one major point of criticism is that the European Union legislated without any consultation with Inuit. ITK described the Inuit exception made by the European Union as an “empty box” and filed suit against the Regulation, although without success.
Our project is intended to develop and implement an alternative, voluntary certification system that focuses on the self-determination of Inuit. We recognize Inuit groups and organizations locally as the key decision-makers and beneficiaries with regard to the certification guidelines, the kind of seal skin products and the associated costs and prices for hunting, producing and selling their product (in the project start phase probably only un-tanned, dried seal skins to Swiss tanneries that will than prepare the skins and produce an end product).
In Switzerland, our research project was well received. Several manufacturers showed interest in buying Inuit sealskins and introducing new products under the project-certification system. In Iqaluit, we also received feedback from the relevant Inuit organizations and the government of Nunavut. Inuit anti-seal-ban activists and Inuit hunter families provided responses to our research questions. It was difficult to say whether in Iqaluit interest or resignation prevailed. What the interviews revealed, however, was that international trade of Inuit seal products, as well as most legal and political activities against the European seal ban, were strongly influenced by the Canadian Government. Discussions with Inuit revealed varying opinions on the similarities between the Inuit seal hunt and the one held in southern Canada. Although many of our interview partners made a clear distinction between both types of seal hunts, others perceived them as very similar. Based on our limited interviews, our impression was that Inuit representatives of political organizations tended to point out the similarities between both hunts while less politically active local Inuit tended to focus on the differences.
The biggest hurdle to initiating our project, however, came from the World Trade Organization (WTO). Canada and Norway together challenged the European Seal Ban Regulation as an unjustified trade barrier in arguments that were brought forward to the WTO dispute settlement bodies. The result of the dispute was the worst-case scenario for Inuit. In May of this year, the WTO Appellate Body held that not only was the European Seal Ban Regulation justified from a public moral stance, but that the Inuit exception in the Regulation actually infringes WTO law and requires adjustment. It is not yet clear how the European Union will implement this decision. However, the most obvious and easiest route for the European Union would be to fully remove the exception for the Inuit.
In Switzerland, the legal situation has also worsened. Shortly after the WTO-decision, the Swiss Council of States agreed to follow the European Union and introduce a legal trade ban for seal products. Although this political decision is not yet final, the chances that the second chamber of the Swiss Parliament, the National Council, will reject the request are minimal. The National Council once before agreed to a seal ban, so it would border on a miracle if the delegates were to change their minds.
We have tried to influence the political debate in Switzerland by providing information about the situation and claims of the Inuit. To help convey our message, we distributed little Ookpiks/Ukpiks, in remembrance of Susan Rowley’s presentation at the IPinCH Cultural Commodification Workshop in 2013. All representatives of the Swiss Council of States received a little Ookpik/Ukpik from ringed seals hunted in Nunavut, designed by Rannva Simonsen and crafted by Inuk Carolina Michaels (photo above). These were accompanied with an information letter, signed by the Swiss human rights organization Incomindios, which has advocated for Indigenous issues in Switzerland since 1974. However, the intervention was not able to stop the political process.
The judicial and political headwind ultimately brought our project to a halt. The partners from the private sectors that had originally agreed to start producing products from Inuit sealskin withdrew. Further financing for the project was denied.
We continue to believe that this project, and what it seeks to accomplish, are important. Sometimes a break provides a chance to reassess and to develop new strategies. We hope there is the opportunity to proceed again in the near future.
The authors wish to thank IPinCH, especially George Nicholas and Catherine Bell, as well as the Inuit Heritage Trust (IHT).
Additional Readings and Resources
Graber, Christoph B., Karolina Kuprecht and Jessica C. Lai. 2012. The Trade and Development of Indigenous Cultural Heritage: Completing the Picture and a Possible Way Forward. In International Trade in Indigenous Cultural Heritage: Legal and Policy Issues, edited by Christoph B. Graber, Karolina Kuprecht and Jessica C. Lai, pp. 463-493. Edward Elgar, Cheltenham (UK), Northampton, MA (USA).
Rowley, Susan. 2013. Ookpik - The Ogling Owl at 50. Presentation at the Cultural Commodification, Indigenous Peoples & Self-Determination Public Symposium, 2 May, Vancouver.
Wenzel, George. 1991. Animal Rights, Human Rights: Ecology, Economy and Ideology in the Canadian Arctic. University of Toronto Press, Toronto and Buffalo.
