Responsibilities

Our Mandate
A Co-management Board
The Role of the NWMB

The NWMB is the main instrument of wildlife management and the main regulator of access to wildlife in the Nunavut Settlement Area (NSA), an enormous region in Canada's Central and Eastern Arctic spanning more than 1.9 million square kilometres, and containing about 43 per cent of the country's ocean coastline. It also includes the 12-mile territorial sea adjacent to Nunavut.

It is the mandate of the NWMB to ensure the protection and wise use of wildlife and wildlife habitat for the long-term benefit of Inuit, as well as other residents of Nunavut and Canada. We are responsible for the well-being of large populations of animals and plants that call this area home: caribou, muskoxen and polar bears; seals, walruses, narwhal, beluga and bowhead whales; arctic char, turbot and shrimp; ptarmigan, snowy owls and peregrine falcons and many, many other species, in addition to lichens, mosses and more than 200 species of flowering plants found on the tundra.

The NWMB is a decision-making body within the NSA, with advisory authority in the waters adjacent to the NSA. Ultimate reponsibility for wildlife management, though, rests with the government of Nunavut and the government of Canada. It is the government that carries out NWMB decisions, once they are made.

In 1994, the NWMB was created as an Institution of Public Government (IPG) under the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement, the treaty signed in 1993 that ultimately led to the creation of the new territory and public government of Nunavut. The Board is part of government because it assists in the overall task of governing with respect to wildlife. However, while our board is funded by Indian and Northern Affairs Canada (INAC), and while we work closely with territorial and federal government departments, we take our direction from the land claim agreement – not from other branches of public government. The NWMB is accountable to INAC, as the funding agency, and to the general public, our key stakeholder.

Like Nunavut's other IPGs, our nine-member board is a co-management board, jointly governed by four representatives of Inuit organizations and four representatives of the governments of Nunavut and Canada (who may also be Inuit) along with an independent chairperson. Members are nominated by Inuit organizations or government departments and appointed by the minister of Indian and Northern Affairs Canada.

Our board also has two alternate members from Makivik Corporation, who represent the Inuit of Nunavik (northern Quebec) when the Board discusses issues relating to the Areas of Equal Use and Occupancy – shared by Nunavut and Nunavik. When the Makivik representatives' participation is required, two regular NWMB members are replaced by the Makivik representatives for the duration of the relevant discussions and decisions.

The Board's membership consists of:

• 3 members nominated by the Regional Inuit Associations, one in each of a the Kitikmeot, Kivalliq and Qikiqtaani (Baffin) regions.
• 1 member nominated by Nunavut Tunngavik Incorporated
• 1 member nominated by the Government of Nunavut
• 1 member nominated by Indian and Northern Affairs Canada
• 1 member nominated by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans
• 1 member nominated by Environment Canada, Canadian Wildlife Service
• 2 alternate members nominated by Makivik Corporation
• an independent chairperson nominated by the Board members

The NWMB meets in person four times a year, with teleconference calls as required between in-person meetings.

The NLCA sets out a number of powers, duties and functions of the NWMB. These include:

• participating in research;
• conducting the Nunavut Wildlife Harvest Study
• establishing, modifying or removing quotas and non-quota limitations on wildlife harvesting
• allocating wildlife resources (including shrimp and turbot quotas)
• approving plans for the management and protection of particular wildlife or wildlife habitats
• approving changes to boundaries of Conservation Areas that relate to the management and protection of wildlife and wildlife habitat
• approving the designation of rare, threatened and endangered species
• establishing qualifications for big game guides
• setting trophy fees
• identifying wildlife management zones and areas of high biological productivity, and making recommendations to the Nunavut Planning Commission on planning matters in that area
• advising governments, the Nunavut Impact Review Board, and others on compensation that should come from developers who damage wildlife habitat
• advising on ways to promote wildlife education, as well as training of Inuit for wildlife management
• providing advice and recommendations to the government on Marine Zones I and II, adjacent to the NSA
• participating in the negotiation or amendment of domestic interjurisdictional agreements
• identifying wildlife management research requirements
• funding research through the Nunavut Wildlife Research Trust Fund and the NWMB Studies Fund
• promoting the training and employment of Inuit in wildlife research.

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