96
Arctic Yearbook 2013
Bounding Nature
the US Environmental Protection Agency (Zaharchenko, 1985), had enacted environmental
regulations since its establishment in 1988. Yet under Putin‘s aegis, the Ministry of Natural
Resources
5
has taken over its functions, arguably eroding environmental regulations in favor of
natural resource development and foreign investment (Peterson & Bielke, 2001). Furthermore, in
Russia‘s Arctic strategy through 2020, the first listed national goal is ―the expansion of the resource
base of the Arctic zone‖ (
Security Council, 2008).
Resource development precedes environmental
conservation. Even the section pertaining to ensuring environmental security states that one of the
chief priorities is the elimination of the ―environmental consequences of economic activity in the
face of increasing economic activity and global climate change,‖ demonstrating that as industry
grows, only its consequences should be curtailed, rather than industry itself. Whereas both Canada
and Russia view their northern regions as potential economic engines, the need to develop resources
is stronger in Russia as the oil and gas resources that fuel the economy dwindle in other parts of the
country. Development in Canada‘s Arctic, at least according to the Northern Strategy, is partly
meant to make local communities self-sustainable, while in Russia, development is sought to help
foster
national
economic growth. In 2008, the Russian Arctic was already generating between 15 and
20% of national GDP, while the Canadian Arctic‘s contribution to national GDP was in the single
digits (Mäenpää, 2008).
In light of this anti-environmental, development-focused climate in Russia, the creation and recent
expansion of the Wrangel Island
zapovednik
requires scrutiny. Few Russian politicians are devoted to
environmental questions (Tynkkynen & Massa, 2001: 11), but Wrangel Island and nearby Herald
Island have managed to attract policymakers‘ attention. The two islands, located in the Chukchi Sea,
have the highest level of biodiversity anywhere in the high Arctic and are home to endangered
species such as polar bears and walrus (UNESCO, n.d.). There are also remnants of Neolithic
camps, mammoths, and furry rhinoceros (UNESCO, n.d.). But Russian policymakers are likely
largely interested in the islands‘ preservation for geopolitical reasons based on their nature and
location, or what we might call ―naturalizing geopolitics.‖ Nature informs geopolitical decisions, and
geopolitics inform conservation strategies, which, in turn, often determine the fate of nature.
Wrangel and Herald Island are near the eastern entrance to the NSR, a route which Putin has said
the country is ―planning to turn it into a key commercial route of global importance‖ (Putin, 2011),
and close to the American boundary. Indeed, the Wrangel Island
zapovednik
was partly born out of
foreign policy posturing during the Cold War in 1976, at a time when the NSR was closed to
international shipping due to security concerns and British and American claims to islands in the
east, including Wrangel Island. The NSR‘s closure demonstrates how Soviet enactments of
sovereignty involved the exclusion of other states from strategic areas, an issue that might be
explored more with an investigation of the country‘s closed cities. Yet with the warming of relations
between Russia and the West in the 1990s, the Russian Federation reopened the route to navigation,
Washington and Moscow briefly considered establishing a joint national park straddling the Bering
Strait and the
zapovednik
grew in size.
6
In 1997, the government extended the original size of the park
– from reaching five nautical miles out to sea to twelve nautical miles, and it followed suit in 1999
extending the park boundaries another twelve miles. In 2004, UNESCO voted to designate Wrangel
Island
zapovednik
a World Heritage Site on the basis of its high biodiversity (UNESCO, 2013).