LYUBOV ORLOVA—The fish bought in Greenland by the ship and served subsequently several times for dinner was called simply “halibut” on the menu; and then someone would say, well, really, it is turbot. It did not taste like my idea of “halibut”—the glorious weighty fish caught in late spring off the shores of northern BC and Alaska; this was softer in texture and smaller. Nor did it taste like what I remembered as “turbot,” so what was it?

Hippoglossus hippoglossus is the scientific name for the Atlantic halibut;

Hippoglossus stenolepis is the scientific name for the Pacific halibut;

Psetta maxima is the scientific name for the European turbot.

Even the website of the Canadian Department of Agriculture flounders (heh, heh) on the subject of why this particular flatfish—which sometimes acts like a roundfish, meaning it can swim vertically—is given the name of two completely different species: “The physical aspects of this fish more closely resemble its relative, the Atlantic halibut, than the European turbot (Psetta maxima), but for reasons too numerous to explain, the species must be marketed in the United States as “Greenland turbot” (so as not to confuse it with Pacific halibut) and in Europe as “Greenland halibut” (so as not to confuse it with true turbot).”

Now you know. The halibut—haly [holy] + obsolete butt [flatfish] was delicious. The Arctic char was even better, and we ate it frozen/raw (country food), raw (sushi-like), smoked, poached, baked and grilled.

The quiet men

Two men can often be seen sitting quietly in the ship’s lounge, each sitting reading his own copy of Pierre Berton’s Arctic Grail (recently re-issued in a handsome large paperback format); this is perfect reading, as we land on Beechey Island, amongst the graves of Franklin’s sailors, and a day or two later sail into the exact same bay where Franklin’s ship was once tethered to an iceberg. When Roger Garland (ex-chief financial officer, Four Seasons Hotels; chair of the Soulpepper Theatre Board) and Martin Connell (ex-Conwest mining company chairman—which founded the now-closed Nanasivik Mine on Baffin Island, ACE Bakery founder, current chair of the Toronto Community Foundation) are not reading competitively, they are playing killer cribbage. Or they might be chatting with another quiet man, Scott Hand (former chairman/CEO of INCO and board member WWF).

There is ambivalence in the Arctic about mining—its impact on the environment and the Inuit way of life, not to mention mineral rights. In the old days (as in Kirkland Lake, Ontario, where I grew up, and where there were seven mines) or in Elliot Lake, when the uranium discoveries exploded in the late 50s, mining companies created townsites, where employers, at all levels, lived with their families; there were also camps or bunkhouses for single men, but there was a sense of permanence (and, it must be said, patriarchy). And towns sprung up around the mines, with schools, churches, hospitals…social infrastructure. Mining companies operating on the Arctic tundra or on the fringes of the Arctic coasts face the challenge of attracting workers away from their own communities for weeks or months at a time; the practice varies from mine to mine, as does the nature of the relationship between the mining company and the Inuit and Innu communities.

In Nunatsiavut (northern Labrador), INCO owns and operates Voisey’s Bay Mine, on one of the richest nickel/copper/cobalt deposits in the world. Under Scott Hand’s leadership, INCO not only negotiated an Impacts and Benefits Agreement with the Labrador Inuit, but also created a trust fund, whereby $100,000 a year supports Labrador Inuit cultural, language and social initiatives.

Scott Hand did not tell me any of this.

Walrus Arctic Dialogues: #4: Scott Hand

Marian Botsford Fraser: What do you find yourself thinking about, as the trip ends?

Scott Hand: What a majestic place this is, and how fragile the environment. People [in the south] have not woken up to the reality of problem of greenhouse gas emissions. It is not part of the popular psyche. There was a recent survey done in which 60% of the respondents said they were NOT willing to change their lifestyle to reduce carbon emissions!

But we have to look beyond the lens of beauty; what is next for its people? The current elders are the last who [know] the old ways, and the modern world has come. We have to look at the north through the lens of economic development as well.

MBF: Was there one thing that struck you especially about the economic issues?

SH: The impact of the anti-seal movement. It is so logical that people do [hunt seal] here and that they can live here in a reasonable way because of that. But what about tourism, what about fishing? The Inuit need to have a say and they will have a say, but it takes time to work through the issues; what can provide sustainable economic development, jobs, revenues? The Canadian government’s approach seems misguided to me. But although Greenland looks so much more prosperous, people shouldn’t be fooled by green and yellow houses.

Maybe I’m being arrogant, but I think mining is key because it provides economic sustainability. We are still working through the issues, the fact that people don’t like the two weeks on, two weeks off work cycle. The Inuit are slowly moving to a different way of life. The old ways are not sustainable as they were three generations ago.

They are a remarkable people and they have remarkable challenges.

MBF: How do you mesh your perspective as a mining executive with your environmental concerns?

SH: One day a few years ago Monte Humel, CEO of the WWF and I, then CEO of INCO, exchanged jobs for one day. He came back to me and said, your company could be much more sensitive to environmental issues, and he was right. I said to him that too many environmental NGOs look only at trying to preserve natural beauty of a place, or a traditional way of living, but they have forgotten the people who live there.

I was in the Peace Corps as a young man and I’ve worked all over the world, in Melanesia, in Africa, South America. International mining is one of the very few industries where you have the rewarding experience of working directly with traditional peoples as something other than an evil capitalist.

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Posted on Monday, September 29th, 2008 at 11:01 am. Follow comments through the RSS 2.0 feed. Comment or trackback.