UAA researchers awarded $750,000 NSF grant to study sustainability in the Arctic

The National Science Foundation (NSF) recently awarded nearly $750,000 to UAA researchers

to study how Yup'ik and Chukchi communities in remote areas of western Alaska and the Russian Far East adapt to changes in the availability of subsistence salmon resources.  These Arctic communities depend heavily upon salmon and other subsistence resources, and they have developed local management systems-or rules-to sustain those critical subsistence harvests.

Acute social, economic and environmental change is occurring in parts of the Arctic at an unprecedented rate and sustainability of arctic communities is critically linked to their ability to adapt to these new circumstances.  The UAA researchers plan to first document existing local management systems and then use the relatively new field of experimental economics to assess how well those systems adapt in the face of change and uncertainty.

The grant was awarded by NSF's highly competitive Human and Social Dynamics program, and it promises several important benefits.  Residents of the indigenous communities will be partners in the study, providing knowledge about local resources and systems.  The study, linked to the International Polar Year, could shed light on how the vastly different political and economic systems in western Alaska and the Russian Far East may affect the responses of communities that share a similar cultural and linguistic heritage.  The research findings could be applied in other remote communities facing similar uncertainties due to climate change.  More information about the resilience of local systems could help improve government resource management policies.  Finally, Alaska's salmon fisheries are recognized as among the best managed in the U.S. and elsewhere.  To the extent that local institutions contribute to that good management, the research could offer insights for better fisheries management in other places.

The project will involve fieldwork in Yup'ik, Cup'ik and Chukchi communities as well as research in UAA's new Experimental Economics Laboratory.  It will also offer significant research opportunities for Alaska Native undergraduate students from participating communities, who will take part in fieldwork and produce reports for their communities.  The principal investigators are: Lance Howe of the Department of Economics; NOAA fellow and anthropologist Colin West of the Institute of Social and Economic Research; and the Rasmuson Chair of Economics, Jim Murphy.