Dr. Heather Sauyaq Jean Gordon is currently an Adjunct Professorial Lect Graduate at American University. She was born and raised in Homer, Alaska and is a member of the Nome Eskimo Community. Read her full bio on her faculty profile on the American University website.
Heather Sauyaq Jean Gordon’s research from 2018 was illuminating. She depicted a side of Alaska that I had never really seen firsthand, one where Indigenous people were pushed to the back of the line and silenced while commercial industries and political pressure dictated the trajectory of fish and wildlife management in the State of Alaska. I especially appreciated the part of her narrative where she included quotations from individuals who responded to her research questions. I was overwhelmed to hear of a generation being raised without the ability to practice the tradition of harvesting clams in Ninilchik because poor management led to closures for nearly a decade. Her work forced me to recognize that I have no understanding of the current management practices in Alaska, so I did a little bit of research of my own.
Question: Does subsistence take most of the fish and game?
ADF&G FAQ about Subsistence
Answer: As a general rule, no. In the 1990s, commercial fisheries took about 97% of the statewide harvest of fish and wildlife; subsistence harvesters took 2%, and sport hunters and fishers took 1%. These proportions vary by area. In the areas with roads, the sport harvest is usually larger than the subsistence harvest. In the areas without roads, the subsistence harvest is larger than the sport harvest. But statewide, commercial fishing is the leader in overall volume.
State of Alaska resource management is handled by the Alaska Department of Fish & Game (ADF&G). The following information was obtained from adfg.alaska.gov and provides an overview of how management is structured.
- Alaska Board of Game and Bard of Fisheries are each comprised of 7 Gubernatorial appointees who serve 3-year terms. These appointees are subject to approval by the Alaska House of Representatives and the Alaska Senate.
- Both boards serve to direct the Alaska Department of Fish & Game based on large game and fish populations. If populations are not at desirable levels, the boards will direct ADF&G to undertake strategies that include closing fisheries, limiting hunting seasons and bag limits, improving habitat, and predation control.
- The Joint Board of Fisheries and Game establishes and determines the guidelines for Advisory Committees which provide some opportunity for citizens to have a voice in the governmental process.
- Advisory committees may serve individual or groups of communities, which determines the overall size and makeup of each committee. Currently, there are 84 advisory committees in the State of Alaska. Advisory committees do not hold the power to enact policy but serve as a liaison for public input for government oversight.
- Non-agency members of the boards and committees are not compensated for their time, but the positions require a great deal of time commitment.
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service deliver additional oversight to the Federal public lands and waterways. They manage subsistence, commercial, and sport fisheries as well as subsistence hunting programs in various areas within and surrounding the State of Alaska. They have scientific input, industry and political pressure, as well as international treaties that dictate their management of animals and marine life.
A few obvious steps toward counteracting the racism that exists in today’s resource management model would be to simply grant Indigenous persons and groups the things they have already asked for:
- Sovereignty over their land
- Restoring more land to the tribes themselves, rather than to the Native Corporations
- Redefine Federal subsistence guidelines to differentiate between Indigenous and urban user groups
- Eliminating blood quantum as a necessary qualification for harvesting marine mammals, working with animal skins, or working with ivory
- Adopt indigenous ways of thinking and accepting the wisdom as it stands, instead of seeking to validate everything using colonial and scientific knowledge.
While these steps seem obvious to me, I won’t pretend that their implementation will be easy. For example, I do not think it is feasible to banish all non-Indigenous persons from the State of Alaska, thus returning all of the land to the original custodians. I have concerns that eliminating the blood quantum requirement for certain activities will lead to greater amounts of fraud and/or insidious acts by people who want to get rich duplicating Indigenous art, leaving no means of prosecuting those offenders. I think it will take a long time to morph our colonial way of thinking into something that closely aligns with Indigenous practices. Just because these changes will be difficult, does not mean we should give up altogether.
Here is an article from Alaska Public Media that I encountered during my research. The audio clip is brief, but it provided some perspective about Western science and Indigenous knowledge that I had not considered before. I encourage you to take a moment to listen to the interview or read the transcript. You can learn more about Tamamta by visiting their webpage, https://www.tamamta.org/
Brendon Mowery
Hey Mindy,
Great job on your blog! I agree that Dr. Gordon really opened my eyes to the prejudice and unfair treatment of the Indigenous people. I think it is kind of sad how often this stuff happens and how nobody cares or realizes that it is happening. This is mainly because some people just don’t care since they are not involved in said prejudice. I’ve always heard that subsistence fishing is the reason why the fish counts are always down, in reality it is because of the commercial fishers. I think that it is interesting how the Alaska Department of Fish & Game is managed. It is not something I ever would’ve thought about before. I would like to know the gender and ethic percentages for those who are in a leadership or managerial position in the ADF&G.
Great job on your post and keep up the good work!
Mindy Haley
While I agree it would be interesting to learn the ethnicity and cultural identities of the entire body of ADF&G leadership, I would not be supportive of asking for quantifying information for each individual (like blood quantum). I did find a photograph of the current Board of Fisheries, but I decided not to include it because I did not want myself – or anyone else – to draw conclusions based on the physical appearance of members alone. This is not something I would have paused to consider had I not watched the video about cultural humility, but it is important to remember that we cannot learn the ethnicity or cultural identity of a person by looking at them.
I am curious to learn your perspective, do you think cultural identity and/or ethnicity disclosures should be required for public positions such as these? Should those disclosures be made available to the public? Does requiring measures such as these benefit or harm the process of fisheries and wildlife management?
Brendon Mowery
I don’t think that they have to be required, because like you said, we don’t want people to have an issue with these jobs because they have preconceived ideas about people who have a different skin color. I do think that if you do have the ethnicity of the members of people in leadership, it can make people more aware of the lack of diversity in certain positions. It can also be useful for statistical purposes to see how a company has become more or less diverse throughout the years. I think that it could be beneficial to the company so they can become more aware of their lack of diversity or if they were aware and it was intentional, making it public can serve as motivation for the company to hire a more diverse staff.
Abbigale Wheeler
Hey Mindy. I really liked the in-depth information and statistics that you provided in your blog. I often times forget just how much of fishing is done by commercial fishermen and not by those who are practicing subsistence. I agree with you that returning more land to tribes rather than to corporations would be a great first step to counteract this issue.
I think that more than anything we need to raise more awareness about this subject and to make sure that the offices in control of fishing make sure to give priority to indigenous and subsistence households. I do know that this would take a while to achieve, but I still find it to be very important to make happen.
Mindy Haley
I’ll be honest, I had absolutely no idea how little the subsistence number would be. I recognize that those statistics were gathered during the 1990s and I would be highly interested to see how they may have changed since then. Still, when I read that FAQ response I had to pick my jaw up off the floor.
One thing I can’t quite figure out for myself yet is how to balance the importance of the economy with the importance of cultural sensitivity and respect. How would the removal of an entire sector of our economy – the monetization of fishing and hunting activities – affect our economy? How many people would be forced into poverty if their means of earning a wage were no longer viable? It can be argued that the absence of animals and fish would force this scenario anyway. Who is to say that the financial needs of the commercial operators are more or less important than the needs of indigenous people groups who rely on the fish for cultural reasons, rather than financial reasons? Furthermore, I am vaguely aware that many commercial fishermen in Alaska are people of color, although I am not prepared to provide any statistics for the statement. It would be worth further research and consideration.
Regardless of how murky the problems and solutions may be, we should not avoid discussing them and striving to find a balance.
Katherine LeBlanc
Hi Mindy, I really like the research you put into your post beyond the required reading. It really shows your commitment to obtaining knowledge on the subject in order to portray it correctly. One of the biggest factual things that stood out to me in both Gordon’s paper and your blog is how sustenance only accounts for 2% of the statewide fish and wildlife harvest. Considering how strictly the state regulates subsistence salmon fishing and how commercial fishing is still allowed, I would assume that the subsistence number would be much higher.
One summer of mine doing summer camps for kids in rural villages along the Yukon River, my coworker and I were lucky to have befriended several elders who loved to share their stories with us. One in particular joined us for a game of uno outside in the grass and told us about what it was like in the village growing up. She told beautiful stories, and the one most of note to me was how when she was a child the river ran full of salmon. She explained to us how the state regulations on sustenance fishing on the Yukon impacted her and the community. The community relies heavily on sustenance, mostly from the river. She told us how she isn’t used to eating so much processed food and she can feel the effects on her body. She told us how the younger kids are growing up without the fish camp culture, not knowing how to cut and dry fish which is a big part of their culture. Hearing these impacts from someone first hand is heartbreaking. However, I think that is what makes it so powerful and important. People who have control over the regulations need to listen not only to how it impacts Indigenous Peoples and rural villages, but also to listen to Indigenous Knowledge as a whole.
Rayanne Alick
Hi Mindy. Thank you for sharing your blog. The youtube video that you had shared was sort of an emotional video for me. I grew up in the village, I grew up fishing, hunting and gathering with my family. Knowing that our ancestors have been through so much in such a short time frame brings out a lot of different feelings for different people. Thank you for brining this into light.
During the years that my village wasn’t allowed to go subsistence fishing, it was really hard on our family. Not just for our food security, but also emotionally. My grandma taught all of her children and grandchildren how to take care of our subsistence. We would spend so many hours and late nights at the fish house cutting, smoking, or putting fish away with family. Spending time together as a family. Having this opportunity taken has drifted us away from our culture and our way of life.
Life is really hard in rural communities. The stores are always low on stock whether it be shipping prices or cancelled flights. The healthcare system is extremely stressful. The clinic helps but it does not have a lot to offer. If you need immediate care and the clinic does not have the capability, flying out would be the only option whether that be to Bethel or Anchorage. It would have to go through a chain of people for approval, then flight scheduling. If the weather isn’t on your side, then it just feels like we have to redo the entire process. I can go on forever about my experiences. It’s all insane and unfair in my opinion. As much as I want to be near my family, I chose to move to Fairbanks to open more opportunities for myself and my family that I have now. There are so much limitations when you are in a rural community.
Thank you again for bringing this topic into light.