Distinguished Scientist
The renowned scientist Dr. Robert W. Corell has accepted a professorship in this new Arctic Institute. Dr Corell brings with him an impressive CV and unique experience for the position, which is financed jointly by the Sámi University College and the International Center for Reindeer Husbandry.

Corell was the leader of the Arctic Council project ACIA (Arctic Climate Impact Assessment), is head of the CAI (Climate Action Initiative), a senior adviser to the Global Environment and Technology Foundation, and former vice president at the H. John Heinz II Center for Science, Economics and Environment .

Al Gore’s adviser
Dr. Corell has been working a lot with research on climate and global change in addition to the interaction between research and policy, particularly research that focuses on global and regional climate change and related environmental issues.

In Tromsø in April 2009 Dr. Corell led the Melting Ice Conference with Vice President Al Gore and Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Støre, and since 2000 he has worked with reindeer herders and researchers in Kautokeino.

Dr. Robert Corell had the original idea for the EALÁT project (Reindeer Herders vulnerability networks study: Reindeer pastoralism in a changing climate) which later was initiated by the Association of World Reindeer Herders. He has been a member of the research group in EALÁT since 2005 and has published several articles together with this group.

Dr. Corell is also a researcher for Arctic Governance Project, an international arctic management study.

Includes Arctic indigenous people
The professorship is awarded to Dr. Corell to honor and recognize his willingness to include the Arctic Indigenous Peoples and their knowledge and understanding in research on the effects of global change.

The reindeer herding societies in all arctic and subarctic regions now face pervasive changes. The challenges of climate change, increased development and globalization are so extensive that we must use the best available evidence in order to adapt to the future.

But which and whose knowledge is this? Of course, the science-based knowledge has been and will continue to be important. But often the best available evidence in fact is the knowledge of the reindeer herders – the traditional knowledge that is developed through careful observation of reindeer and nature, transmitted from generation to generation, and used every day by both reindeer herders in the tundra and the taiga.

Dr. Robert Corell is widely known for hes support to include the Arctic indigenous peoples in research and reviews, and with this new position he will be better able to continue to support the ongoing efforts to develop adaptation strategies for future climate change in Arctic communities.

Read the press release and view pictures here on the Reindeer Portal

- From a Norwegian point of view, it is interesting that Sweden in a few month, have the Presidency of both EU and Barents Cooperation.

Wednesday he and Carl Bildt visited Kirkenes before they got on a bus to Murmansk. Sweden will during the Ministerial meeting of the Barents Council on Thursday take over the chairmanship for the Barents Cooperation after Russia.

In addition, Aleksei Miller, chair of Gazprom, noted that extensive efforts would be made to support social development in this remote corner of Russia, which is of interest given GAZPROMs activities in areas of reindeer husbandry.

Støre wants greater European involvement in the regional northern cooperation bodies, because Norway sees a holistic development of the North and the Arctic.

- Both Norway and Sweden are keen to get a better synergy of collaborative projects that go across borders in the north, as in the Arctic Council, the Barents Cooperation and the Baltic Sea Cooperation.

The Barents cooperation meeting coincides with the biggest business conference ever in Murmansk. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov opens Murmansk Economic Forum together with André Arthur Tsjilingarov who became world famous when he planted the Russian flag on the seabed at the North Pole.

Lavrov said in a statement before the forum that the Arctic is part of Russia.

- We are convinced that the Arctic in the future will be a region characterized by peace, stability and cooperation. This is all the Arctic countries’ profits, especially through the cooperation of key organizations such as the Arctic Council and Barents cooperation, “said Lavrov.

www.nrk.no/nyheter

“I don’t give a damn what all these foreign politicians … are saying about this. If someone doesn’t like this, let them go down themselves and try to put something there. Russia must win. Russia has what it takes to win. The Arctic has always been Russian.” (A. Chilangarov)

But of most interest to the Reindeer Blog is what he writes about reindeer husbandry and the challenges they face in Sakha Yakutia in the face of climate change – which in mainstream Russian scientific circles is not happening, a notion contradicted by Bob Corell (Arctic Climate Impact Assessment author, Heinz Center scientist and EALAT team member also quoted in the article). The mainstream view in Russia is that it is currently getting colder. The author visited several villages in Sakha Yakutia interviewing reindeer herders, horse breeders and wild reindeer hunters.

Read the full article here. / Download pdf here

The four-year, $4-million International Polar Year project aims to gather consistent data across the circumpolar region on those herds, how they are changing, and how that affects people who depend on the animals for survival.