Impact and Benefit Agreements and the Political Ecology of Mineral Development in Nunavut
Mining has been a major economic activity in the Canadian Arctic for the last century. It has made a valuable contribution to the development of this fragile economy and to the living standards of its inhabitants. The benefits include jobs and income, tax revenues and the social programs they financ...
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ftunivwaterloo:oai:uwspace.uwaterloo.ca:10012/992 2024-06-02T08:02:52+00:00 Impact and Benefit Agreements and the Political Ecology of Mineral Development in Nunavut Hitch, Michael 2006 application/pdf 17833318 bytes http://hdl.handle.net/10012/992 en eng University of Waterloo http://hdl.handle.net/10012/992 Copyright: 2006, Hitch, Michael. All rights reserved. Environmental Science Political Ecology Impact and Benefit Agreements Nunavut Mining Doctoral Thesis 2006 ftunivwaterloo 2024-05-07T03:31:54Z Mining has been a major economic activity in the Canadian Arctic for the last century. It has made a valuable contribution to the development of this fragile economy and to the living standards of its inhabitants. The benefits include jobs and income, tax revenues and the social programs they finance, foreign exchange earnings, frontier development, support for local infrastructure, and economic diversification into a broad range of activities beyond the life of the mine. These benefits emerge as the result of activities and influences of several actors that exercise differing degrees of power, whether coercive or exchange by nature. These benefits, however, do not come without costs, particularly to Northern peoples who have suffered historically from the inequitable distribution of resources benefits and inevitable, adverse socio-cultural and biophysical impacts of rapid resource development. Impact and Benefit Agreements (IBAs) are a mandatory aspect of the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement. Proponents wishing to develop natural resources on Inuit-owned land are required to negotiate and complete an IBA with the Regional Inuit Organization. These agreements have evolved from simple socio-economic contracts, to multiparty assemblages of agreements designed to promote sustainability beyond the operating life of the mine. A political ecology approach was taken. Using this approach, it was determined that the distribution of decision-making power appears to be unequal and largely confined to the Industrial and Regional Inuit Association actors. As a result, other affected interests were marginalized in the process including members of the local community, environmental and other non-governmental organizations, and federal, territorial and hamlet government actors. Nevertheless, the use of IBAs signal a recognition on the part of all stakeholders that historic mining practices are no longer acceptable and that it is now necessary to move towards a more equitable and sustainable approach to mineral development. In ... Doctoral or Postdoctoral Thesis Arctic inuit Nunavut Nunavut Land Claims Agreement University of Waterloo, Canada: Institutional Repository Arctic Nunavut |
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Open Polar |
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University of Waterloo, Canada: Institutional Repository |
op_collection_id |
ftunivwaterloo |
language |
English |
topic |
Environmental Science Political Ecology Impact and Benefit Agreements Nunavut Mining |
spellingShingle |
Environmental Science Political Ecology Impact and Benefit Agreements Nunavut Mining Hitch, Michael Impact and Benefit Agreements and the Political Ecology of Mineral Development in Nunavut |
topic_facet |
Environmental Science Political Ecology Impact and Benefit Agreements Nunavut Mining |
description |
Mining has been a major economic activity in the Canadian Arctic for the last century. It has made a valuable contribution to the development of this fragile economy and to the living standards of its inhabitants. The benefits include jobs and income, tax revenues and the social programs they finance, foreign exchange earnings, frontier development, support for local infrastructure, and economic diversification into a broad range of activities beyond the life of the mine. These benefits emerge as the result of activities and influences of several actors that exercise differing degrees of power, whether coercive or exchange by nature. These benefits, however, do not come without costs, particularly to Northern peoples who have suffered historically from the inequitable distribution of resources benefits and inevitable, adverse socio-cultural and biophysical impacts of rapid resource development. Impact and Benefit Agreements (IBAs) are a mandatory aspect of the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement. Proponents wishing to develop natural resources on Inuit-owned land are required to negotiate and complete an IBA with the Regional Inuit Organization. These agreements have evolved from simple socio-economic contracts, to multiparty assemblages of agreements designed to promote sustainability beyond the operating life of the mine. A political ecology approach was taken. Using this approach, it was determined that the distribution of decision-making power appears to be unequal and largely confined to the Industrial and Regional Inuit Association actors. As a result, other affected interests were marginalized in the process including members of the local community, environmental and other non-governmental organizations, and federal, territorial and hamlet government actors. Nevertheless, the use of IBAs signal a recognition on the part of all stakeholders that historic mining practices are no longer acceptable and that it is now necessary to move towards a more equitable and sustainable approach to mineral development. In ... |
format |
Doctoral or Postdoctoral Thesis |
author |
Hitch, Michael |
author_facet |
Hitch, Michael |
author_sort |
Hitch, Michael |
title |
Impact and Benefit Agreements and the Political Ecology of Mineral Development in Nunavut |
title_short |
Impact and Benefit Agreements and the Political Ecology of Mineral Development in Nunavut |
title_full |
Impact and Benefit Agreements and the Political Ecology of Mineral Development in Nunavut |
title_fullStr |
Impact and Benefit Agreements and the Political Ecology of Mineral Development in Nunavut |
title_full_unstemmed |
Impact and Benefit Agreements and the Political Ecology of Mineral Development in Nunavut |
title_sort |
impact and benefit agreements and the political ecology of mineral development in nunavut |
publisher |
University of Waterloo |
publishDate |
2006 |
url |
http://hdl.handle.net/10012/992 |
geographic |
Arctic Nunavut |
geographic_facet |
Arctic Nunavut |
genre |
Arctic inuit Nunavut Nunavut Land Claims Agreement |
genre_facet |
Arctic inuit Nunavut Nunavut Land Claims Agreement |
op_relation |
http://hdl.handle.net/10012/992 |
op_rights |
Copyright: 2006, Hitch, Michael. All rights reserved. |
_version_ |
1800747337680683008 |