The future of the Bering Sea depends on tribal-led management

This article originally appeared in The Circle: Arctic Biodiversity: Where is it heading?. The Circle shares perspectives from across the Arctic, and the views expressed here are not necessarily those of WWF. See all Circle issues here.

The Bering Sea is one of the world’s most important ecosystems. With its critical socio-environmental, economic and cultural values, it is also a bellwether of Arctic change. LAUREN DIVINE describes the rapid transformations that are taking place in the ecosystem of the Indigenous Unangaxˆ(Aleut) communities of St. Paul and St. George—the islands comprising the Pribilof Islands in Alaska’s Bering Sea—and how local, traditional and Indigenous knowledge and tribal-led management are addressing them.

THE CHANGES NOW happening in the Pribilof Islands are taking a toll on wildlife, human and ecosystem health, local economies and cultures, with alarming declines of fur seals, sea lions, seabirds, fish and invertebrates. The decline in laaqudan (northern fur seals) is a particularly acute example. Our communities depend on these seals, but their population has diminished to less than a quarter of their historical peak of about 2.1 million.

These changes are compounded by large-scale commercial fisheries and the residual impacts of over-exploitation of marine resources. To respond to these impacts, our communities pursued area-based conservation that centre on Indigenous values to preserve the area’s long-term integrated ecosystem.

Protective circles

There is no question that the Pribilof Islands are part of an ecologically, socio-economically and culturally significant area that warrants a protective designation and inclusive management approach. In 2017, the City of St. George showed incredible foresight and leadership when it successfully nominated a 50 kilometre circle around most of the island (37 kilometres north toward St. Paul Island) to the US National Marine Sanctuaries inventory.

Expanding on this effort, the Aleut Community of St. Paul Island Tribal Government began to synthesize western science with traditional, Indigenous and local knowledge to refine an area that would encompass the needs of an ecosystem that is critical to the area’s communities, marine mammals, seabirds and other species. This region, called the Pribilof Islands Marine Ecosystem, extends about 185 kilometres around both of the inhabited Pribilof Islands. Our vision is to designate a comanaged marine area that will address our conservation concerns, provide continued fishing opportunities and ensure the sustainability of our local economies.

There are many Indigenous-led conservation efforts across the globe that we can look to for guidance in creating successful co-management frameworks. They facilitate approaches that are more culturally and ecologically appropriate and have successfully incorporated diverse kinds of knowledge (such as place-based and experiential knowledge) into science-based resource management decisions.

Drawing on Indigenous values

Now more than ever, we see the ability to come together with the federal government, affected industries and other stakeholders to achieve shared conservation and economic resilience goals for our marine ecosystem. The communities have concluded that the best existing method or tool for this effort is a National Marine Sanctuary designation because it provides additional potential strategies for the islands that fall within the larger ecosystem, such as the creation of cultural heritage and subsistence use areas.

The incredibly productive Bering Sea ecosystem has sustained Indigenous Peoples, marine mammals, seabirds, fish and invertebrates for millennia. Indigenous values, rooted in thousands of years of traditional and Indigenous knowledge, are inherently adaptable, dynamic and designed to preserve longterm ecosystem health. Through triballed stewardship of our marine ecosystem, our communities will continue to draw on these values to anticipate and manage the future use of the Bering Sea sustainably.

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LAUREN DIVINE is a marine biologist and director of the Ecosystem Conservation Office for the Aleut Community of St. Paul Island Tribal Government.