Thank you. He and I spoke beforehand, so I'll start us off.
Madam Chair and honourable members of the committee, thank you for this opportunity to speak to you on the important issue of Arctic science and research in relation to climate change.
The Arctic Research Foundation is a non-profit charity that enables and catalyzes community-led science and infrastructure projects in the Arctic. We work with communities to build networks of NGOs, universities, researchers and governments to fund and deliver programming, while providing access to ships, green energy-powered mobile labs and other research infrastructure.
Many issues need addressing in regard to science and climate change in the Arctic, but there's a single common factor making it harder to address problems and capitalize on opportunities. Unlike other Arctic nations, Canada lacks a cohesive, cross-departmental and holistic national strategy for the Arctic.
Let me back up and discuss some of these issues. Shockingly, the Arctic Ocean may be ice-free in less than a decade. The region is warming at least four times faster than the rest of the world. Many northerners are living through devastation. Communities are losing up to 90% of their buildings to fire and flood, sometimes both in a single year, and are even collapsing into the very ground as permafrost erodes.
However, climate change is far from the only issue. China is increasing its holdings in the north, including purchasing a stake in a Northwest Territories rare earth minerals mine. They've added the Arctic to their belt and road initiative. They're creating a new form of capitalistic colonialism that's making rapid inroads into Canadian territory. At the same time, the United States denies Canada's claim to sovereignty over the Northwest Passage. Even amidst its war against Ukraine, Russian submarines are testing the boundaries of Canada's waters, and we have no idea what other countries may be up to under the surface.
I highlight issues related to sovereignty and security in addition to science because it cannot be overstated that these issues are deeply intertwined and must be addressed as such. Other nations see the value in tackling these problems together and are taking decisive action to address them. In 2022, the United States adopted the national strategy for the Arctic region. This strategy mandates that the entire government work cross-departmentally to address Arctic issues. No such strategy exists in Canada. Government departments are far too often working in isolated silos, leading to duplicated effort, wasted time and wasted taxpayer money.
Upon realizing the federal government's lack of a national vision for Canada's Arctic, ARF stepped into the policy world to develop a draft implementation plan for Canada's Arctic and northern policy framework in a document entitled “Arctic National Strategy”. We offer it up to parliamentarians as a foundation upon which to build this holistic strategy for the north. The strategy is built around four pillars: reconciliation and the co-production of knowledge; protecting the environment while understanding and adapting to climate change; capacity building and economic development; and Arctic data governance and management. It was written in collaboration with northern senators, leaders and communities, and is built out of high-impact recommendations, common-sense policy changes and shovel-ready projects that can have a meaningful impact on the biggest issues facing the Arctic. We'll be submitting this policy to the committee for your review.
These recommendations range from piloting new ways to conduct fish stock assessments to changing federal funding structures to investing in green energy-powered containerized agriculture to help alleviate food shortages. Here's one example relevant to the committee's study from the strategy.
While research is now conducted with more community consultation and collaboration than in the past, federal grants are still administered through a system that is based on southern ways of thinking. They have enormous administrative burdens. Grants for Arctic research follow the same procurement rules as grants to study Lake Winnipeg or the forests of New Brunswick. This means that while communities may have more funding in theory, in practice it can be very difficult to actually get those funds out the door.
These grants also rarely carry additional funds to reflect the dramatically increased costs of operations, goods and transportation in the Arctic. Universities have experienced researchers, dedicated staff and departments with expertise in applying for government funds, as they should, but it is not fair to expect communities, many of which may only have a handful, if any, of full-time permanent administrative staff, to shoulder the same administrative burden.
The Canadian government needs to modify funding and grant application structures to be more equitable for northerners. You can see this in a number of different ways, wherein government structures are simply too rigid to work properly in the north. As a very good example of that, I understand the need for interpretation, but unfortunately, because Jackie is in the north and has been travelling, he was unable to procure a headset. As a result, he's unable to testify at this committee. I think that's a very poetic example of how these structures work.
My remarks have been submitted already. I'll cut this short so that I can give Angus a chance to speak.