The report, issued by the Waterloo, Ont.-based Centre for International Governance Innovation, highlights the "urgent need" for a more coherent approach to planning the Arctic's future and greater co-operation with the U.S. and corporate players in preparing for the coming development boom - including oil-and-gas development, tourism and trans-Arctic shipping.
The independent think-tank's study was co-authored by CIGI research fellow and Arctic policy analyst James Manicom, University of Manitoba security and defence specialist Andrea Charron and Carleton University trade and transportation expert John Higginbotham, a former diplomat and top federal adviser on the Asia-Pacific Gateway and Corridor Initiative.
"Intense activities in commercial, investment, diplomatic, legal, scientific and academic sectors abound in the new Arctic, but the region's long-term significance is only gradually penetrating North American public consciousness," states the CIGI policy paper, echoing previous analyses that Canadians - and Americans even more so - are not grasping the significance of the climatic and economic changes unfolding in the Far North.
The push for increased attention on Arctic challenges comes at a time when Canada is poised to take on a two-year leadership term at the eight-nation Arctic Council in 2013-14.
Next year also represents the UN deadline for Canada to submit a bid for what's expected to amount to millions of square kilometres of new undersea territory on the Arctic and Atlantic Ocean floors, widely viewed as a potential offshore resource bonanza.
The report recommended that Canada promptly reopen its recently shuttered trade office in Anchorage, Alaska as a "small but useful step" to encourage a "more, rather than less, sophisticated binational dialogue" between Canada and the U.S. on Arctic development issues.
Original Article
Source: canada.com
Author: Randy Boswell
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