The Arctic: Seeing is believing

 
Called Opel Project Earth, the initiative is a public outreach campaign that supplements the company’s efforts to reduce its GHG footprint, such as through its new line of electric vehicles.
Project Earth sounds like one of those wildly ambitious but impractical ideas hatched in meeting rooms and bars around the world.  “Hey, what if we took a group young people to four of the most remote corners of the planet to see for themselves the impact that climate change is having on ecosystems and people?  How about Gombe National Park in Tanzania?  And what if we followed that with a visit to the harsh, austere and magnificent environment of Canada’s High Arctic?  Afterwards, we could head south again for a dip in the ocean waters off Baja California. And we’ll finish off by plunging into the dense rainforests of Panama.”  I used to dream up set lists for Beatles reunion concerts that were about as realistic as this idea.

Well, the dream is now a reality, and thirteen lucky adventurers (plus a big group of accompanying filmmakers and such) have just spent several days in Tanzania, hosted by the Jane Goodall Research Centre, to learn more about community-centered conservation and development programs in the Kigoma region.  Yesterday they arrived in Montreal, and today we’ll meet up with them in Ottawa.  Now, it’s time for them to don their fleece vests and windbreakers and head up to Pond Inlet, at the northern end of Baffin Island, several hundred kilometers north of the Arctic Circle.
With our facilitative assistance – and with the outstanding organizational support of David Reid, Pond Inlet’s locally based tour operator – they’ll get a chance to see for themselves.  They’ll experience first-hand the implications of a changing climate, as our travel plans will need to be adapted to the unstable ice conditions in the waters of Eclipse Sound.  They’ll learn that wild animals are truly wild, and don’t perform at the whim of humans, so we can’t say for certain what their chances are of spotting polar bears or narwhal.  And, most importantly, they’ll hear directly from the Inuit who live there – community leaders, elders and others – who’ll tell them about the past traditions, the current challenges they’re facing, and their varied hopes, dreams and aspirations for the future.
Stay tuned for more from Pete and myself in the days to come; in the mean time you can learn the immediate reactions of the participants themselves on their blog.