Title: Tradition and Change in the Sub-Arctic: Sami Reindeer Herding in the Modern Era
Abstract: FOR THE SAMI OF NORTHERN SCADINAVIA and the Kola Peninsula of Russia (see Figure 1), the reindeer (rangifer tarandus tarandus) has played an integral part in survival and livelihood in the sub-arctic. Over the last millenium, herding and husbandry of reindeer have developed among the Sami into a viable livelihood in a modern cash market economy. Although the majority of Sami today do not rely on reindeer as a primary source of income (only an estimated 10-15 percent of Sami in Finland are full-time herders [Nuorgam 1999:4]), the image of the Sami and the reindeer have become synonymous. [FIGURE 1 OMITTED] This article examines changes in reindeer herding and husbandry as it has adapted from an intensive system to its current extensive form in the modern cash market economy. It also looks at how this shift has affected those Sami in northern Scandinavia who continue to derive either most or some of their income from reindeer herding. Concerned primarily with Sami issues in Finland, Norway, and Sweden, this work is based on previously documented sources as well as this author's own observations during fieldwork in the northern Sami village of Kultima (see Figure 2), located in the Finnish province of Enontekio (summer 1999). [FIGURE 2 OMITTED] Several key elements are at work here: the adoption and use of modern tools and technology by herders, the ongoing issues of land use rights especially as they relate to herders, tourism, and the forest industry, and the role of governmental and European Union regulations in transforming herding and slaughtering practices. Many of the changes that have allowed reindeer herding to continue to compete economically in the modern market have served only as short-term solutions to growing problems of multiple use of the northern regions. While modern processes and technologies, such as supplementary feeding and the snowmobile, have allowed for increased herd size on decreased pasture areas, they have only delayed many of the same problems they sought to solve in addition to increasing the economic burden on the reindeer herder. As a growing number of outside economic institutions, such as forestry and tourism, have continued to vie with reindeer herding in the north for access to and use of land, the Sami, like many pastoral groups, have been forced to give way. When such change occurs, reindeer herding is in some way harmed. Either the size of grazing pastures decreases along with the herd size and its ability to support the herder, or, if herd size does not decrease, productivity or at least potential productivity will. Continual encroachment on pastures coupled with ever-rising overhead costs necessary to maintain reindeer herding as a viable livelihood have led to an overall decrease in the total number of active herders. More and more the small-scale reindeer herder is being replaced by larger, more corporate forms of reindeer management, which are better able to absorb costs associated with the extensive form of herding. This change has created a funnel effect over the last forty years in which reindeer herds are increasingly in the hands of a select few. The small-scale herder, once the majority, is today often forced to work for large owners or to seek outside wage labor to supplement his income from reindeer herding. In some cases, small herders are forced to abandon herding altogether as the economic costs of maintaining reindeer have become too great. By gaining a better understanding of the current situation of reindeer herding, we can then examine how it has been shaped through historical and economic processes. In tutu, encounters between pastoral societies and ever-expanding trade and political power of capitalist firms and polities can be better understood (see also: Ingold 1980, Hjort 1990, Caro 1994, Gilles and Gefu 1990, Beach 1990, Casimir 1992). HISTORICAL CONTEXT A basic understanding of the historical relationship between the Sami and reindeer is necessary to comprehend how reindeer herding has made the transition into the modern era (i. …
Publication Year: 2003
Publication Date: 2003-06-22
Language: en
Type: article
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Cited By Count: 13
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