Nunavut

Geography

The territory covers 2.093.190 square kilometers of ground and water in the Canadian Far North, having taken T.N. - O. part of the continent, majority of the Canadian Arctic islands whose island of Ellesmere in extreme-north and part are Île Victoria in the west, and all the islands of the Hudson Bay, the Baie James (including the islands Belcher) and the Baie of Ungava.
The areas bordering include the Territoires of the North-West in the west and the Manitoba in the south; the marine borders touch the Greenland in the east (through the Détroit of Davis, the Baffin bay and the Chenal of Kennedy) and the Quebec in south-east (through the Détroit of Hudson and by its southernmost islands).

Nunavut is composed of three areas: Baffin, Keewatin and Kitikmeot.

The capital of Nunavut is Iqaluit (in the past Frobisher-Bay), on the island of Baffin in the east. Among the 26 communities of the territory, one finds Pangnirtung, Kimmirut, Rankin Inlet and Cambridge Bay. See List of the communities in Nunavut.

The creation of Nunavut created also only “the four corners” of Canada, with the intersection of the borders of Nunavut, the Territories of the North-West, Manitoba and Saskatchewan, with 60°00' NR, 102°00' O, on southern bank of the Lac Kasba.

Population

Nunavut with the smallest population and least dense of Canada: 29 300 inhabitants (2004) disseminated on a surface similar to that of Western Europe. If Nunavut were an independent country, it would have the least dense population in the world, since it has almost the same surface and half of the population of the Greenland. 85% of Nunavummiut are autochtones.

Currently, approximately 40% of Nunavummiut have less than 15 years.

The population of Nunavut is touched by important social problems: Unemployment, lack of residences, Delinquency, Alcoholism, Suicide S. One of the causes of unemployment is the importance of the language English E on the job market of the area, that Nunavummiut speak little, wishing to continue to use their own language, the Inuktitut.

Government

The Head of State of Nunavut and the representative of the Queen are a police chief chosen by the federal government; as in the other territories, its role is symbolic system. The current police chief of the federal government is Ann Meekitjuk Hanson.

The chief of the government is the Prime Minister. Its ministers and are elected to him by the legislative assembly. Current the Prime Minister is Paul Okalik, re-elected in February 2004.

The 19 deputies at the legislative assembly unicamérale are individually elected; there are no parties and the legislature operates by a system of consensus. The last elections took place the February 16th 2004; no local party exists in Nunavut.

Vis-a-vis criticisms on his policy, the Prime Minister Paul Okalik instituted a council of 11 elder, the inuit qaujimajatuquangit . This group advises the government to integrate the culture inuite in the laws and political decisions.

The annual budget of the territory is approximately 700 Canadian million Dollar S (approximately 490 million Euro S) which comes almost entirely from the federal government. The former Canadian Prime Minister, Paul Martin, registered “the support for the Canadian Far North” like a priority of his government for 2004: 500 million dollars to be distributed per annum between the various Scandinavian territories.

There are obviously other reasons with unemployment that of nonthe knowledge of the English language: in two decades the population underwent a sedentarisation forced under cover of social security. This process, and this same without questioning or disputing the beneficial contributions or the good intentions of the Canadian government, caused a total change of the lifestyles, and the adaptation to fixed work hours, and with fixed residences, is in hand. The use of the resources by the Canadian government, and the drainage of the richnesses to sub-contract them in metropolis can also be regarded as a factor of unemployment. See in particular For better including/understanding Nunavut, acts of the Nunavut day of the 1/30/99 . At the new generations, which thus did not know the forced nomadism and displacements, certain behaviors attest of a deep malaise (suicides, drug, sexual violence in particular).

Like the other territories, Nunavut consists of only one federal electoral constituency, also named Nunavut, whose deputy is Nancy Karetak-Lindell Liberal party of Canada; as well as senator.

History

Old

The currently known area as Nunavut has been populated continuously for 4000 years. The majority of the historians identify the island of Baffin with the Helluland of the Sagas norses, therefore it is possible that the inhabitants of the area had occasional contacts with sailors Norse S. See also Paléoeskimo and Néoeskimo.

The written history of Nunavut begins in 1576. Martin Frobisher, while directing a forwarding to find the Passage of the North-West, believed to have discovered ore of Or close to current the Baie of Frobisher on the coast of the island of Baffin. The ore was without value, but Frobisher made the first known European contact with Inuit. The contact was hostile: Frobisher captured four Inuit and brought back them in England, where they perished.

Other explorers came at the 17th century in search from the Passage from the North-West, of which Henry Hudson, William Baffin, and Robert Bylot.

In 1893, Joseph and James Tyrrell, employed by the Geological Commission of Canada to explore the interior of the grounds of the Keewatin, left the Lac Athabasca located at the border of the Alberta and from the Saskatchewan, descended the river Dubawnt, crossed the area of Chesterfield Inlet and skirted the coast of Hudson Bay until Churchill. The following year, Joseph Tyrrell explored and charted the southern part of the interior of the grounds of Keewatin.

For the period of colonization by the Canadians, Inuit were constrained with the sedentarisation using coercive methods, of which the massacre of the Chien S eskimos.

(to be supplemented on the colonial history of Nunavut)

Modern

Negotiations for an agreement on the territorial claims started in 1976 between the federal government and the Tapirisat inuit of Canada. In April 1982, a majority of the residents of the Territories of the North-West voted in favor of the scission, and the federal government approved it conditionally seven months afterwards. The agreement on the territorial claims was concluded in September 1992 and was ratified by close to the 85% of the voters of the Nunavut future. In June 1993, the Parlement of Canada adopted the Loi concerning the agreement on the territorial claims of Nunavut and the Loi on Nunavut ; the transition led to the creation of Nunavut on April 1st, 1999.

See too

Canada
Ministry for the Indian businesses and North Canada
Canadian Provinces and territories
List of Canadian cities
Air Nunavut
Flag of Nunavut
List of the Prime Ministers for Nunavut
List of communities in Nunavut
List of the provincial and territorial symbols of Canada

External bonds

Official site Government of tourist Nunavut
Official site of Nunavut

Beats-smg: Nunavuts Simple: Nunavut Zh-min-nan: Nunavut

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