Heterogeneity and Resilience of Human-Rangifer Systems: A Circumpolar Social-Ecological Synthesis

1. Heterogeneity and Resilience of Human-Rangifer Systems: A Circumpolar Social-Ecological Synthesis Gary Kofinas, University of Alaska Fairbanks, USA Matt Berman, University of Alaska Anchorage, USA Brad Griffith, University of Alaska Fairbanks, USA Gennady Belchanski, Russian Academy of Science, Russia David Douglas, US Geological Survey, USA Bruce Forbes, Arctic Centre, Lapland Konstantin Klokov, St Petersburg State University, Russia Leonid Kolpashikov, Extreme North Agricultural Research Institute, Russia Stephanie Martin, University of Alaska Anchorage, USA Craig Nicolson, University of Massachusetts, USA Don Russell, Environment Canada, Canada

2. Our project’s goals: • Improve understanding of the relative resilience and adaptability of regional Human-Rangifer Systems to the forces for global change • Derive generalized propositions about their functional properties as aspects of the Arctic System.

3. Common assumptions A Fragile Arctic Ecosystem?

4. Common assumptions “Highly Adaptable” Indigenous Northerners… (AHDR)

5. 1950-2000 1950-2000 (Nellemann et al. 2001)

6. Social-ecological heterogeneity

7. Overarching hypothesis The heterogeneity of state factors (e.g., geography, climate change, land-surface changes) and their interaction with unique regional processes (i.e. ecological, socio-economic, institutional, and cultural processes) give rise to differing forms of resilience and vulnerability, with implications to the sustainability of human-environment dimensions of the Arctic System.

8. Resilience in Human-Rangifer Systems is …the degree to which the ecological and social processes can absorb disturbance, reorganize without loss of basic governing properties, and enable herds and communities to adapt to diverse and dynamic regional conditions, with Rangifer continuing to provide a primary means of support for the local population.

9. Ecological Social

10. Moving beyond sustainability... assumptions of change: Chaotic Balanced Fragile Resilient (Gunderson and Holling 2001)

11. From S Carpenter

12. Six Regional Case Studies Yamal Taimyr Central Barrens Teshekpuk = Range of Rangifer = Calving grounds = Domestic herds Western Arctic Porcupine

13. Towards a Synthesis • A retrospective analysis of change to understand driving factors and internal processes • How did they change and how are they different? 2) A comparative analysis cases to understand heterogeneity and its implications to resilience and vulnerability • Why are they different? 3) Develop rule-based simulation models for exploring common system dynamics • What does that tell us about the system?

15. North American caribou herd sizes Ecological Heterogeneity

16. A measure of ecological resilience

17. NDVI-Calf survival relationship for Porcupine Herd What is the relative ecological value of caribou calving grounds? (Griffith et al)

18. Lichen calvers Swamp calvers

19. Sea ice – NDVI relationship

20. DATA ALONG 10 TRANSECTS WERE EXTRACTED FOR THIS DEMONSTRATION ANALYSIS TYMe LENA TYMw INDI SUDR CHUK WAHw CAHm PCHw PCHe

21. PCHe PCHw 1997 WAH CAH CHUK INDI LENA SUDR TYMe TYMw

22. CHUK SUDR WAH INDI CAH LENA 1 JUNE – 10 September day of year: green=onset, red=maximum, blue=senescence, PCHw TYMe PCHe TYMw

23. CARIBOU Energetics MODEL CARIBOU Population MODEL NDVI Distribution Late spring Green-up (timing, rate) • diet and intake rate • maternal condition • early calf growth • post-natal weaning • post-natal calf • survival Early summer Peak biomass (timing, magnitude) • diet and intake rate • (insect harassment) • maternal condition • calf growth rate • summer weaning • summer calf • survival Late summer Senescence (timing, rate) • diet and intake rate • (insect harassment) • maternal protein • early, normal, • extended weaning • calf/cow condition • over-winter calf • survival • probability of • pregnancy

24. ecological data

25. Modes of production protection Pastoralism subsistence accumulation Hunting Ranching sharing predation market (Ingold 1980:4)

26. Example of Collapse and Social-Ecological Regime Shift Pre- Perestroika Post- Perestroika

27. Example of Collapse and Social-Ecological Regime Shift Harvesting of Wild Reindeer in Russia xc1000

28. Conflict areas between wild and domesticRangifer of the Taimyr (Klokov 2002)

29. Commercial caribou hunts In Canadian Arctic = Meat processing facility = Large-scale Community Hunts • Agencies: Dept of Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development; Health and Social Services; Agricultural and Agrifood Canada • Co-management Boards and local HTAs • NWT’s Special Committee on North Economy (SCONE) Current commercial activities • Led to “DevCorp” • Responsibility for meat marketing within and outside of Canadian Arctic (adapted from Dragon 2002)

30. Socio-economic data

31. Regional socio-economic model that explains regimes shifts

32. Comparative Studies in co-management: Regimes of North America multi-stakeholder Cooperative management Short term recovery team International and Canadian co-management agreements Jurisdictionally fractured management ad hoc, unfunded planning group Long-standing formal co-management

34. Institutional data

36. Price Domestic herd + - - + Wild herd Climate Towards the construction of simple models: Wild-domestic levels, price, and climate

37. CARMA Network (Circum-Arctic Rangifer Monitoring & Assessment Network) • ~40 participants from seven countries • Gearing up for intensive IPY monitoring • Interests in remote sensing, field-based studies, community monitoring • Climate; habitat; genetics; energetics; disease and parasites, predation, population dynamics, human uses and responses to change; decision-support tools • We’re helping with the overall synthesis

38. Making our progress, one step at a time…….

39. Where we’re at… • We are facing the normal process challenges of interdisciplinary research, but it seems that past experience helps • We’re grappling with the task of clarifying resilient to whom and resilient for what • We’re trying to stay focused on Social-ecological linkages and integrated measures of resilience that we can operationalizing • We’re grappling with the thorny problem of accounting for regimes shifts and thresholds. • We are initially pleased with our focus on “Relative resilience” – as a useful comparative method for understanding social-ecological vulnerabilities.

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