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15.2.4 Protecting Natural and Cultural Resources
For indigenous Arctic people, the relationship with fish, and specifically with
salmon, plays an important role in maintaining their identities as distinct cultures.
Salmon provides them with more than nutrients. It also plays a role in ceremonial
traditions, creating important ties between people and their environment.
The Arctic is undergoing dramatic climate change which threatens indigenous
people, impacting their food security and traditional knowledge systems which rely
on fishing activities for their physical, cultural and spiritual wellbeing. Coastal
indigenous peoples in the Arctic share links to marine environments, mainly through
fishing. The relationship with the sea plays an important role in maintaining their
identities as distinct cultures, but climate change is threatening indigenous people’s
ties to oceans and marine resources around the world (Yoshitaka 2017). Fisheries
management is a human security issue as well as an environmental issue, and we
need to bring social equity into global governance of the oceans, to respect coastal
indigenous peoples and their relationship with fish.
Preserving traditional knowledge with regard to fish skin is essential to the Arctic
world. This chapter seeks to draw attention to the vital importance of traditional fish
leather craft to the Arctic people as the basis of their culture and a component of
their identities and to encourage their artisans to reintroduce the skills used by their
ancestors as a tool for community development.
15.3 Sustainability Context Icelandic Fish Skin Leather:
Concepts of Sustainability. Aligning Fish Skin Leather
with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal
14. Life Below Water
15.3.1 SDG 14.3 Reduce Ocean Acidification
Sustainable Development Goal 14:3 is “Minimise and address the impacts of ocean
acidification, including through enhanced scientific cooperation at all levels”.
Atlantic Leather’s production of fish skin leather using fish waste aligns with
this goal.
Global production of fish has steadily increased over the last decade, and more
than 50% of the total fish catch becomes waste material resulting in 32 million
tonnes of waste (Arvanito and Kassaveti 2008). To date, the European Environment
Protection agency allows seafood processors to dispose of fish skins in marine
waters, but this is expected to change as the decomposing organic waste can suck up
available oxygen from marine species and introduces disease into the local ecosystem (EPA 2012). Unlike the EU’s fisheries policy, the Icelandic system decrees that
E. Palomino
15.2.4 Protecting Natural and Cultural Resources
For indigenous Arctic people, the relationship with fish, and specifically with
salmon, plays an important role in maintaining their identities as distinct cultures.
Salmon provides them with more than nutrients. It also plays a role in ceremonial
traditions, creating important ties between people and their environment.
The Arctic is undergoing dramatic climate change which threatens indigenous
people, impacting their food security and traditional knowledge systems which rely
on fishing activities for their physical, cultural and spiritual wellbeing. Coastal
indigenous peoples in the Arctic share links to marine environments, mainly through
fishing. The relationship with the sea plays an important role in maintaining their
identities as distinct cultures, but climate change is threatening indigenous people’s
ties to oceans and marine resources around the world (Yoshitaka 2017). Fisheries
management is a human security issue as well as an environmental issue, and we
need to bring social equity into global governance of the oceans, to respect coastal
indigenous peoples and their relationship with fish.
Preserving traditional knowledge with regard to fish skin is essential to the Arctic
world. This chapter seeks to draw attention to the vital importance of traditional fish
leather craft to the Arctic people as the basis of their culture and a component of
their identities and to encourage their artisans to reintroduce the skills used by their
ancestors as a tool for community development.
15.3 Sustainability Context Icelandic Fish Skin Leather:
Concepts of Sustainability. Aligning Fish Skin Leather
with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal
14. Life Below Water
15.3.1 SDG 14.3 Reduce Ocean Acidification
Sustainable Development Goal 14:3 is “Minimise and address the impacts of ocean
acidification, including through enhanced scientific cooperation at all levels”.
Atlantic Leather’s production of fish skin leather using fish waste aligns with
this goal.
Global production of fish has steadily increased over the last decade, and more
than 50% of the total fish catch becomes waste material resulting in 32 million
tonnes of waste (Arvanito and Kassaveti 2008). To date, the European Environment
Protection agency allows seafood processors to dispose of fish skins in marine
waters, but this is expected to change as the decomposing organic waste can suck up
available oxygen from marine species and introduces disease into the local ecosystem (EPA 2012). Unlike the EU’s fisheries policy, the Icelandic system decrees that
E. Palomino