GREENLAND Will the world’s first sovereign Inuit nation be created by global warming? How climate change may make more accessible natural resources the key to financial independence. by John Bechtel, Freelance writer one day be the first nation-state with an Inuit There are some who look Danish, but who the world with local business operators, majority, and if so, it may also have achieved speak Greenlandic. and no one could speak more passionately that status because of climate change. And there are a few anomalies like Sarah or convincingly about the joys of life in Woodall, featured here, who was born in Greenland than she does. She loves the land, So who, or what, exactly, Asuncion, the capital of Paraguay in South the outdoors, the people, prefers the cold are these Greenlanders? America, adopted by American parents, to the sticky hot, and says it’s all a matter of The answer to that question is hotly grew up in Washington, D.C., earned a knowing how to dress in layers using the debated in Greenland. For some, it is more right materials. And Sarah’s hair is on fire Sarah Woodall Masters Degree in Tourism at George about the language than the land. Some Washington University, got an opportunity about all things Greenland! She wants you to reenland’s got buzz. Greenlanders Greenlanders are dark-skinned with dark to intern in Greenland, fell in love with it visit her and her friends at www.greenland. are well along on the road to self- eyes, the classic Inuit look, and they speak and made it her home. com and whet your appetite for the big five Gdetermination politically. Their culture Greenlandic. There are others who have She is a Greenlander by choice—not by attractions: dog sleds, ice and snow, northern is gaining global recognition, and just this the same coloring but who don’t speak an accident of birth. Today, Sarah represents lights, whales, and pioneering people. year Greenland was named a Lonely Planet Greenlandic. There are some who are 100% Visit Greenland, promoting travel by Top 10 Best in Travel Destination! It may Inuit, but who were born in Denmark. coordinating travel professionals around (Continued on page 10) I WINTER 2016 -2017 | SCANDINAVIAN PRESS SCANDINAVIAN PRESS | WINTER 2016 -2017 J Continued from page 9) The world’s largest island and a coastline longer than the circumference of the earth With the largest ice sheet outside of Antarctica, it should have been named Iceland, but that name was already taken. Instead the Vikings named it Greenland in the hopes others would come. The world’s largest island, about the size of Mexico, Greenland has a population of only 56,000. On the northwestern corner, Greenland is only 30 kilometers (18 miles) from PHOTO: REDDIT PHOTO: Canada’s Ellesmere Island, and the EXITEFUN.NET PHOTO: smallest distance between Greenland An inviting view—a beautiful summer day in Greenland National Park. Greenland’s elite Sirius Dog Sled Patrol team, stationed in northeast Greenland. Hvalsø Church, built around 1300, was and Iceland at the narrowest part a church in the abandoned Greenlandic which survives and thrives by means prosperity and self-determination. of the Greenland Strait is about 320 qualifies as a desert. The park is the are still no highways, and travel is done Norse settlement of Hvalsey, in of imports. What does Greenland Extraction of natural resources is kilometers (199 miles), small enough world’s northernmost protected by boat on water and small planes and southern Greenland. The best produce and have to trade in exchange an expensive and dirty process, and that conceivably a polar bear could landmass, about the same size as helicopters on land. But for a price, the preserved Norse ruins in the country, for all the goods they import? In 2014, environmental damage is almost a swim the distance—although polar France and Spain combined, and is comforts and conveniences of modern the church was the location of the Greenland sent 79.89% of all its exports certainty. There is also the resource bears that occasionally show up in uninhabited except by members of the life are in evidence everywhere. Apart last written record of the Greenlandic to Denmark, valued at US $432 million, curse, the dubious benefit of the “devil’s Iceland usually make most of the trip famed Sirius Patrol. Comprised of six- from the Sirius Patrol and a few other Norse—a wedding in September 1408. but it also receives an annual subsidy excrement”—becoming overly reliant on traveling on ice floes. Why swim when dog sled teams, two men and 11-to-15 areas, dog sledding is largely reserved Today, the church appears much as it from Denmark of about $650 million. a few dominant industries/commodities you can catch a ride? dogs per sled, they reinforce Danish for tourism, as are “native” dress did when abandoned in the 1400s. _______________________________ sovereignty over Greenland and patrol performances. With a Gross Domestic Product in which then decline on world markets 16,000 kilometers (9,942 miles) of Because of its geographical isolation, 2014 of $2.44 billion, how long could taking the country down with it. What In spite of the fact that Greenland is one of the cleanest, coastline along the northeastern corner sparse population, extreme climate, and Greenland survive without that subsidy? Faustian bargain is Greenland willing to contraceptives are free to women in most pristine and unspoiled of the national park. There are about 50 lack of easily accessible and exploitable make for nationhood? Greenland, the island has the highest environments left on this planet. supply depots scattered around, but the resources, Greenland and its people Developmental issues _______________________________ abortion rate in the world at 50.45% Its landscapes are breathtaking, teams practically live on their sleds. have evolved at a leisurely pace at the Greenland has been steadily Wikipedia lists 74 cities, towns, of all pregnancies. These social issues ethereal, and otherworldly. We Eighty percent of Greenland is edge of history. It just didn’t seem to achieving greater autonomy, with the and settlements in Greenland. are not unique to Greenland, but are do not seek here to romanticize covered by ice sheets, and 89% of be much good for anything other than aid and collaboration of the Danish Almost a third of the island’s pervasive in all parts of the Far North, subsistence hunting and fishing for Greenland, or yearn for a Greenland’s population is indigenous government, and there is a vigorous population lives in the capital and like falling dominoes derive from Inuit. Technology has made rapid a hardy few who followed their prey. the harsh climate and remote existence Rousseauian return to pure nature, independence movement among the city of Nuuk, and there are only modernization possible, and in all Even today only 1% of Greenland’s land of tiny populations. but to see Greenland as it is, a land Inuit population. There is no question 12 other communities with a but the most remote areas phone and is arable and it cannot grow enough that under all that ice and bedrock and and people undergoing a rapid rite population over 1,000 people. internet are available, although there food to feed its miniscule population, submerged under the icy Arctic waters Early history of passage on their way to possibly 86% of the population lives in the becoming the youngest nation- lie extensive and valuable mineral Greenland is geographically part of resources that could conceivably make few larger towns, and the other North America, but is geopolitically state on the planet. 14% live in tiny and very rural _______________________________ Greenland a miniature Norway with an part of Europe because of its Viking enviable sovereign wealth fund instead settlements. history. An early population of _______________________________ The world’s of being a financial drain on its parent indigenous Arctic people called the country. As climate change makes Dorset had died off before the Vikings largest national park Greenland went from the lowest extraction of these resources more suicide rate in the world to the highest arrived, but about midway through the Greenland has the world’s largest attainable and potentially profitable in just half a century. The current Viking tenure in Greenland, a tribe national park, almost a million square on world markets, the prospect of suicide rate at 100 per 100,000 is 24 of proto-Inuit migrated to northern kilometers (386,102 square miles), Greenland becoming financially times the suicide rate of the United Greenland from Canada (probably which is larger than all but 29 countries viable also makes nationhood more States, and it is mostly their young Ellesmere Island) following prey in the world. The interior of this park is than fantasy thinking. The economic people who are killing themselves. No animals. Today, we refer to them as the mostly part of the Greenland Ice Sheet, requirements are the final barrier to one knows the cause for sure, but social Thule civilization. some parts of which are almost two Greenlanders’ self-ownership. problems of high alcoholism, poverty, The Vikings settled Greenland miles thick. Despite that fact, the tip As exciting and tantalizing as this and incest all contribute. In Greenland during a warming period from about of this national park known as Peary EXITEFUN.NET PHOTO: prospect is, Greenland is faced with almost every teenager knows someone 800 A.D. to about 1300. Being farmers, Land, by precipitation measurement, Hiking is a popular activity in Greenland National Park—the world’s largest. some tough trade-offs in the race to who has committed suicide.