A Northern moment: Polar Continental Shelf Program (video)

Transcript

Honourable Dan Vandal, Minister of Northern Affairs: It's great to be here this morning. We know that climate change is occurring faster in the north than it is in the south. We know that there's all sorts of issues that our government and our society needs to address and we're going to do it based on science, based on evidence. So the work you are doing is so very important.

David Mate, Director, Polar Continental Shelf Program, Natural Resources Canada: Actually, I'm sitting here today in our field equipment warehouse in Ottawa and you can see behind me there is a skidoo and some of the parkas and some of the gear that you know that we do provide to research in the north. We also have a lot of staff and expertise in coordinating aircraft and air charter movements so whether it's helicopters or fixed wing aircraft like the Twin Otter that fly in to very, very remote parts of the country. If there's a priority, we try to move people.

Text on screen: Polar Continental Shelf Program focuses on:

• building northern partnerships and supporting Arctic science,
• procuring in the north, and
• working with communities and post-secondary institutions to support Indigenous participation in the PCSP and scientific research.

Derek Muir, Senior Research Scientist and Section Head of Priority contaminants fate and bioaccumulation, Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC): So this is some pictures of the seawater sampling. We've done it both from the ice so on the right hand side Peter is working with a sampling kit that we sent him annually and he does all the work himself and he works out of the lab at Polar Shelf Resolute. Two scientific slides coming up, brace yourselves. But basically just to show that we have a long term sampling story here. We wouldn't really be able to do it practically without Polar Shelf support. We have the lake water chemistry, we have the mercury in the fish, other contaminants. We have fish conditions and temperature. So it's becoming not only a measure of things like pollution, global pollution but it's also becoming a climate change story.

Jennifer Provencher, Research Scientist, ECCC: We work on seabird contaminants in my group and we rely heavily on the Polar Continental Shelf Program for this work. You can actually see here the picture, there's two pictures of elders on a site visit to the migratory bird sanctuary. And so not only is PCSP facilitating the researchers and community members who do the work, they're actually facilitating co-management of these regions with community members and elders and allowing us to visit the site together to discuss priorities, discuss management and research going to be done by this co-management framework.

Text on screen: The Polar Continental Shelf Program works with 15 federal departments, 25 Universities, and many northern organizations with the help and support of local residents.

Dr. Scott Lamoureux, Geography Undergraduate Program, Queen's University: The work we do is in remote settings that are heavily supported by the logistical support and expertise of Polar Continental Shelf, there's a lot on this slide but what we are doing is intensive integrated scientific research to understand land, water and long-term environmental change in these settings and this is the kind of work that requires long-term partnerships, logistical support and scientific goals and we have been able to do this since 2003.

Text on screen: The PCSP provides tents, winter clothing and other essential supplies to support remote field camps, which allow scientists to conduct their state-of-the-art research.

Dr. Mary Sanborn-Barrie, scientist with Natural Resources Canada studying geological mapping: My role is to conduct geological mapping of exposed bedrock in the Canadian Shield all across northern Canada. The location, the colour, the texture, the composition, the mineralogy and to take samples to analyse the age and the chemistry. And in doing this we can reconstruct the story that the land has to tell us about its evolution back to millions and in fact billions of years ago. And so PCSP supports us in three main aspects, field equipment, air service contracts and also communication.

Honourable Dan Vandal, Minister of Northern Affairs: The levels of mercury in fish and I'm assuming wildlife in the far north, can someone explain to me how that occurs in terms of the food chain transfer?

Derek Muir, Senior Research Scientist and Section Head of Priority contaminants fate and bioaccumulation, ECCC: There actually are still guidelines for consumption of seal liver in the Arctic because of very high levels you know and yet we don't really want to discourage people from eating foods like that. A small helping of seal liver isn't going to hurt you compared to the benefits you know in terms of the fatty acids and other things in the food.

Honourable Dan Vandal, Minister of Northern Affairs: Excellent. Well I want to thank everyone for taking the time to share this hour with me, it's been very enlightening for me. And I look forward to meeting you all in person one day, post COVID. Thank you.

Text on screen: Since 1958, the Polar Continental Shelf Program has proudly supported scientific research to increase our understanding of the challenges and opportunities in Canada's North.

Text on screen: Video courtesy Natural Resources Canada

Text on screen: Thank you to the participants:

• Dr. Derek Muir, Senior Research Scientist and Section Head - Priority contaminants fate and bioaccumulation, Environment and Climate Change Canada
• Dr. Mary Sanborn-Barrie, Senior Research Scientist with the Central Division, Geological Survey of Canada
• Dr. Jennifer Provencher, Research Scientist, Ecotoxicology and Wildlife Health Division, Environment and Climate Change Canada
• Dr. Scott Lamoureux, Professor and Robert Gilbert Chair, Associate Head, Geography Undergraduate Program, Queen's University
• Valerie Amarualik, Resource Management Officer, Artist, and Polar Continental Shelf Program contributor
• Peter Amarualik Sr., Hunters and Trappers Association of Resolute and Polar Continental Shelf Program contributor

Text on Screen: Canada wordmark