Oil, Tourism, Subsistence, Commercial Fishing: The Great Debate

Michael Krebs

The state of Alaska is often referred to by its well-deserved nickname of the “Last Frontier.” It has been given this nickname for many reasons but mostly because of Alaska’s wealth of flourishing wildlife and seemingly endless amount of pristine environment. Along with its pure beauty Alaska is a very diverse state. This is because of the mass amount of resources ranging from amazing mountain ranges down to the very make up of the land itself. The beauty of the state alone attracts tourists from around the world while resource exploration is widely used in different forms such as: oil exploration, commercial fishing, and subsistence living. With the interests of such groups all playing a certain role in the everyday functioning of the state, it can easily be understood why there is a great debate about which is the most important.

This debate over what is best for the state of Alaska is a very touchy subject depending on whom you ask. All areas of debate, from tourism to subsistence living, play their own special role, and share their own advantages and disadvantages, in keeping Alaska functioning smoothly. It is possible that without one of these key areas of the Alaskan lifestyle everyday life would never be the same. After my recent visit to this beautiful state I have learned and listened to many different people from all of these different viewpoints and I have grasped a fairly unbiased view toward both how the state actually functions and how it possibly should function.

One of the first areas I would like to address is that of tourism, since I have currently placed myself into this category. Tourism has been around in Alaska since the state’s existence. It is one of the different ways that the state can receive an inflow of cash from outside the state. Although tourism does not play a major part in Alaska’s economy and political arena it does serve as a way to bring in the extra money needed to maintain the current economy. Tourism brings people and money into the state through many different means. People visit the state of Alaska for business purposes, vacation/pleasure, and visiting friends and/or relatives. They arrive by means of air, highway, or water, and they travel all aspects of the state. With the large abundance of state and federal land set aside in the form of parks and forests there is plenty for tourists to do and see throughout the state.

According to the Alaska Visitor Industry Economic Impact Study of 1999, “During the 12-month period from October 1997 through September 1998, Alaska hosted 1.35 million non-resident visitors. This total includes vacationers and business travelers, as well as those combining business and pleasure. The results of this study indicate that visitor traffic yields substantial economic benefits for Alaska” (Division of Tourism et al. 1999: 1). They then go on to explain that in the one-year time frame non-resident visitors spent approximately one billion dollars (or $949 million). Of all the money spent throughout the year, $845 million of it was spent during the summer months of 1998 (Division of Tourism et al. 1999: 1). This shows how tourism is much more intense during the summer months and less during the winter months. I was fortunate enough to go to Alaska in the spring and I was able to see the state before and during when the vegetation was coming into bloom. The weather was unbelievably warm when I was there so this made it a very good experience; but when talking to the locals there it was easy to gather that the winter months were not the ideal time of year to be in the state.

Some of the locals that told me this were Dune Lankard and his good friend David Titcomb. They were unbelievable people that we were fortunate enough to meet in the fishing city of Cordova. Dune and David gave me a more than warm welcome when I was invited to their house to meet them. They treated me better than family and shared their unbelievable stories with me. David shared his crazy story of how an avalanche came down from the mountain behind his house and took out windows and part of his roof, filling up his house with snow. He followed up this story with the funny advice of how you should not live in Alaska during the winter months. I guess that is why tourism is not nearly as intense during this time of the year.

Dune then shared other stories with us and one was of how he was so successful in saving lands in Alaska. He explained how he has put forth loads of effort throughout his life in stopping his own Eyak Corporation and others from clear cutting lands in Alaska. He then went on to talk about all of the money necessary to make his fighting possible. His efforts would not entirely be possible without the use of tourism. He takes donations from many different tourists that he attracts to the area for just that specific reason. Dune made it pretty clear that he targets very wealthy people to come visit Alaska and specifically the lands that he is trying to save from deforestation. Once he gets them into Alaska he treats them to white water rafting and kayaking trips to get a first hand look at the lands that he feels should be left alone for everyone in the future to see. If the tourists feel the need to donate money then Dune showed that all of the money is used for the expenses needed to go about trying to save the different lands. Dune puts money in the areas where it is needed most depending on what land is in the most danger at the time. So in Dune and David’s case tourism is seen as a very beneficial industry for the state of Alaska.

Tourism also brings many jobs to Alaska and pays many wages in Alaska. All of the visitors and vacation/pleasure tourists bring lots of money to be spent and they give many opportunities for jobs. According to the Alaska Visitor Industry Economic Impact Study of 1999, “When all employment sources are considered, the visitor industry accounts for 8% of all employment in Alaska and 5% of all earnings. The vacation/pleasure (tourism) component of Alaska’s visitor industry accounts for 6% of employment and 4% of total earnings” (Division of Tourism et al. 1999: 41).

Although tourism brings many good things to the state such, as money and jobs, it does have its disadvantages. Too many people in such a pristine environment leads to a negative impact. This is because much of the vegetation is around the Prince William Sound has had very little human interaction. I learned very quickly from a sea kayaking trip, that I went on in the area, that it is very important to leave everything better than when you found it. Though this is a mere impossible task it was stressed very much by my guides on the trip. The guides explained that if we leave the littlest trace of our presence anywhere and then they brought other people out to the same spot in the future and did the same thing, it would begin to build upon itself until a very noticeable presence could be seen. This would then make the area unattractive for future kayaking parties who would want to see the once untouched area. The same thing holds true for an over abundance of tourists who are not careful. Too many careless people in the same area could have an unwanted effect on the environment for future users.

Some of these future users may be people that practice subsistence living. “The term ‘subsistence’ refers to the hunting, fishing, and gathering activities which traditionally constituted the economic base of life for Alaska’s Native peoples and which continue to flourish in many areas of the state today. Subsistence is more than the right to hunt and gather wild and traditional foods, it is about human beings. Subsistence is a way of life in rural Alaska that is vital to the preservation of communities, tribal cultures and economies” (Alaska Federation of Natives 2002a: 1). Natives take subsistence very seriously and they practice it because it is a representation of whom they are. They believe in it so much that they feel it is the very definition of what it means to be Alaskan (Alaskan Federation of Natives 2002a: 1).

Subsistence provides all of the products needed for a village to survive. Everyone has their own role in the village to help collectively provide what is needed for the village as a whole. For instance, certain men may go out and hunt or fish to provide for the whole village while women and children may go and pick seaweed and fruits for everyone. They then would combine their products to satisfy everyone’s needs. Subsistence living involves the shared efforts of everyone in the village and that is the key to success. Money is not a big worry in such villages because they can find or make all of the necessities needed to survive within their own environment.

Another key to subsistence living is managing animal populations and keeping a clean environment. Since you depend so much on the environment you live in and the animals that also rely on the same environment, it is essential to take care of both areas. Only taking the amount of animals needed helps to ensure more animals for future generations. Not letting anything go to waste is also a high priority in subsistence. Natives find ways to use virtually every piece of everything that they take from nature. This may include anything from making animal hide clothing to grinding medicine from animal bones.

“Throughout the past 250 years, the technologies of Native subsistence have changed, a number of people have adjusted to the use of modern instruments of harvest, transportation, and types of storage” (Alaska Federation of Natives 2002b: 1). This makes it debatable to many people as to what can be considered true subsistence living. I talked to many people in stores and on the streets of Alaska who felt that use of modern technology for subsistence was unacceptable and should not be allowed. I also could see the need to use modern technology for subsistence because of the increased pressure by outside forces. A good example of this comes from the Alaskan Federation of Natives (AFN) when they stated, “In the past 20 years, rural Alaskans have witnessed vast changes. Steady growth and development have increased competition for fish and game, threatening the survival of communities. The subsistence harvest, only 2 percent of the entire fish and game harvest of Alaska, is vital to the survival of subsistence-dependent families” (Alaska Federation of Natives 2002b: 1). This helps to show how overrun subsistence living is becoming by outsiders.

The obvious advantage of subsistence is the lack of need for money and economics. Another advantage is that there is no incentive to ruin any part of nature. No one would want to timber or clear-cut forests because they would get no money for them and also they would be ruining their needed environment. A lot fewer greedy people would be around because everyone would be providing for everyone else, and products must be shared to satisfy everyone’s needs. It would do no good for someone to keep tons of fish that they could not eat when they may need something else such as clothing or medicine.

Disadvantages to subsistence are that you are, as many people say, “out of the loop” with what is going on in the rest of the world and also “behind the times,” meaning you do not always have up to date technologies. It is not always a bad thing to not have the best technology but when everyone around you is so much more advanced than you, it makes it hard to compete. Not that you are trying to directly compete with people around you but indirectly you are both using the same environment. If fishing technologies get too advanced everyone will be catching fish before you get a chance. Subsistence living also has the disadvantage of relying too much on nature. Nature is known for its unpredictability and if certain weather or storms were to come through and wipe out some of your lands, then what can you do? This is probably the most serious risk in subsistence living.

“Protecting subsistence rights is one of the main priorities of AFN. Having lost much ancestral land holdings and many of their inherited rights over the past two centuries, Alaska Natives have expended enormous human, financial, and political resources in order to protect subsistence rights. To Alaska Natives, state and political opposition to subsistence rights is a direct attack on their traditions and cultures. The long battle over subsistence rights has yielded both wins and losses for Alaska Natives” (Alaska Federation of Natives 2002c: 1). It is a hard subject for Natives to protect their rights because from a governmental perspective subsistence does not produce jobs or money for the economy of either the state or federal government. On the other hand, it can be taken into account that subsistence cares much more for the environment than can be said for the government’s economics and/or politics. Subsistence is seen as a traditional style of living that is handled in a very ethical manner.

Another traditional style of industry is commercial fishing in Alaska. Commercial fishing is a very big part of Alaska’s economic base (Sustainable Economy Group 2001: 8). “The fishing industry supports one-sixth of the state’s economy and employs 40,000 of its residents, more than any other of the state’s basic industries” (Department of Treasury IRS 1994: 1). This also varies depending on certain times of the year because jobs can fluctuate during the fishing seasons. “Alaska produces 60 percent of the nation’s seafood and 2 percent of the world’s supply… After oil, commercial fishing produces more wealth in Alaska than any other industry” (Department of Treasury IRS 1994: 1). From these numbers it is easy to draw that the Alaskan fishing industry plays a fair role in the Federal government. This also explains why fishermen voiced their opinions during the debates on the Exxon Valdez oil spill.

One of the major fishing cities in Alaska is Cordova. Since I had the pleasure of visiting Cordova on my trip to Alaska I received the chance to talk one of the most influential fishermen of them all, Dr. Riki Ott. I attended a meeting with her and soon found out what an energetic, intelligent person she is. Riki explained many of her experiences with the Exxon Valdez oil spill and all of the ongoing problems still lingering to this day. She also explained how the fishing is not all back to the way it was before the spill regardless of what Exxon says.

Another area that Riki touched on was the disadvantage that Cordova was at. What I mean by this is that since Cordova is a fishing city they have nothing to fall back on when the fishing is not going well. Obviously the Exxon spill was no natural occurrence but it was something that shocked every fisherman in the area. People in Cordova lost their whole livelihood, or in other words reason for living, when they could no longer fish in the Prince William Sound area. Dr. Ott also explained that all people in Cordova took the shock differently. Some people became very quiet and stayed to themselves while others began binge drinking and became violent along with many other horrible reactions. No one knew how to deal with such a problem because some areas, such as this, in Alaska are totally centered around commercial fishing and that is all they know.

Another disadvantage of commercial fishing is the population of the targeted fish. Along with natural patterns of fish numbers that change every year, it is also crucial that fishermen do not exhaust their targeted population. Fishermen usually target a one certain area that they fish every year and since the fishing industry is trying to make as much money as possible then fishermen will try and catch as many fish as they can. Due to improved technology fishermen can catch fish more easily as time goes on. Along with this it is also true that in netting certain types of fish it is possible fishermen may have to throw out close to half due to undersize or other reasons (Department of Treasury IRS 1994: 1-4). “In listing of 1992 catch quotas, not a single bottom-fish species was on the increase in Alaska. Six species were stable, three decreasing, and the status of five species was unknown. The huge, fish-eating Steller sea lions of the region have declined by two thirds, plus certain sea birds are in decline” (Department of Treasury IRS 1994: 1-4).

Overall, the commercial fishing industry holds a very big role in the economy of Alaska and in the United States. It provides many jobs and salaries for thousands of people in the area and it also helps to bring in cash from outside the American market. Expansion in this industry is not very likely since there is only a set population of fish but it can continue to thrive and provide for the future as long as fishermen keep in mind what will be needed in the future.

Another industry that has a limited supply is the oil industry in Alaska. The oil industry is the largest producer in the state’s economy. “A new study released today on Alaska’s oil and gas industry shows that the industry spends $2.1 billion annually in the state” which can be compared to the $2 billion that Alaska’s general fund spends each year (Alaska Oil and Gas Association 2002: 1). “The petroleum industry is Alaska’s largest nongovernmental industry. It generates 12 percent of all nonmilitary payroll and 9 percent of all nonmilitary jobs in the state” (Alaska Oil and Gas Association 2002: 3). The oil industry is the largest industry in Alaska’s major cities of Fairbanks and Anchorage. There are the greatest number of people in these areas and the average pay of the oil industry is the higher than any other jobs so many people can seek good paying employment (Alaska Oil and Gas Association 2002: 4).

One of the biggest disadvantages to the oil industry is the constant posed threat to the environment. Nearly the whole time I was in Alaska, studying the Exxon Valdez oil spill, I was talking to people that were either trying to come up with new and safer ways to transport oil or trying to completely get rid of the oil industry in the state. One of the pieces of advice that I heard the most was to buy more energy efficient vehicles. A number of people told me this because they thought it to be the only way to really fight the oil companies. Alternative energy was also an issue that came up more than once. Wind, solar, and tidal energy were the types that Dune Lankard seemed to be most in favor of. I found tidal energy to be surprising because in Michigan, where I am from, it is not really an issue. I find it pretty amazing to see how much time and money we put into developing things that hurt our environment when we could be using that same time and money for good development such as alternative energy sources.

Shipping oil poses major threats to the ocean and coastal areas around Alaska as we have come to find out. The Exxon Valdez oil spill is a prime example of what can happen while transporting oil by tanker. Not only did this spill hurt the states economy through fishing losses but also through the mass degradation of the environment. By environment I am talking about the land, water, air and all of the animals that go with them. When I was in Cordova I had a chance to speak with Kelley Weaverling, who played a big role in cleaning up the animals that were affected from the spill. Kelley stressed to me that it was not just one or even a few species of animals that were affected by the spill but rather all species. He noticed impact in species of fish, land mammals, and even birds from the area. However, this spill does not even rank in the top 50 of oil spills around the world in terms of size. It makes you wonder how there are more than 50 oil spills that have leaked over 11 million gallons of crude oil around the world.

The Alaska pipeline is also a major concern for transporting oil. In a meeting that I attended with the Regional Citizens Advisory Council (RCAC), it was made very clear by Dan Lawn and John Devens that the pipeline also poses a major threat to many areas inland. The pipeline runs across many tributaries of rivers that feed into the Pacific Ocean. If the pipeline were to fail in any way over such areas it could destroy an unknown amount of animals and environment. To this day, however, one of the few reported glitches in the pipeline was because a crazy man was shooting at the pipeline with a high-powered rifle and somehow punctured a hole in it. It then took days before the problem could be properly taken care of.

Another huge disadvantage of oil is that some day it will run out. Oil is an exhaustible resource that we are currently using in mass quantities. We have become very dependent upon oil when we know we have to come up with an alternative energy source in the not-so-distant future. This will not be good for the Alaskan economy because they depend so heavily on it. Alaska takes full advantage of the oil industry as it is today but when the oil does start to run out they will have to make drastic changes to keep their economy steady.

Another person who shared his ideas on the oil industry with me was Richard Fineberg. Richard has been doing research on the oil industry for many years and he has a great wealth of knowledge on the topic. One of the points that he brought to my attention is on the debate over whether or not we should drill for more oil in northern Alaska. The comparison he used was to the major countries that currently own the supposedly wealthy leading exporting oil fields. Most of the top names on the list, such as Iraq and Kuwait, are not the names of rich and modernized countries but instead are the underdeveloped countries that suffer economic instability and poverty. Richard also pointed out that other factors do play a role in this phenomenon but the facts are there. If some of the biggest oil producers, or exporters, in the world are not prospering from the industry then what is the huge debate over drilling in Alaska?

The main reason to look at all of these aspects of life in Alaska is to show which industries are leading the way and then to suggest which ones should be leading. Obviously out of oil, subsistence, commercial fishing, and tourism it is the oil industry that is currently paving the way but is that in the best interest of Alaska? I would definitely have to say it is not. What good can come from placing your state in a position to be dependent upon a nonrenewable resource, other than short-term success? This clearly is not the best industry for the state and I propose that any of the other alternatives would be better than the one the state is currently at. However, if forced to choose one alternative as an industry in Alaska, I believe that tourism would be the best alternative.

Tourism, as I said before, contributes outside money into the state and local economies of Alaska. Visitors and vacationers can come from all around the world to see the pristine environment that cannot be seen anywhere else in the world. This would also put forth a reason to leave the environment untouched in Alaska for the site and use of future generations. Alaska is not called the “Last Frontier” for no reason and it should be kept that way for everyone to benefit from. Visiting a place with such astonishing sites can give individuals lifted spirits and let them see how beautiful the world really can be, outside of the smog and tree ridden farm fields that we have become accustomed to.

Dune Lankard is a key example of using tourism to save the environment. People want to see the sites in Alaska and they will take the necessary steps to help protect them. You cannot replace things such as the Copper River Delta and all of its secrets. Neither can you replace the wild salmon that run every year on their natural cycles. Things such as these should not need to be replaced because they should be protected to keep at least one place left on earth that we as humans have not impacted.

Works Cited

Alaska Federation of Natives. 2002a. Subsistence-Introduction. http://www.nativefederation.org/wellness/subsistence/index.html. (May 27, 2004).

Alaska Federation of Natives. 2002b. Subsistence-Present. http://www.nativefederation.org/wellness/subsistence/present.html. (May 27, 2004).

Alaska Federation of Natives. 2002c. Subsistence-AFN’s Role. http://www.nativefederation.org/wellness/subsistence/political/index.html. (May 27, 2004).

Department of Treasury Internal Revenue Service. 1994. “Alaskan Commercial Fishing: Catcher Vessels Part I.” http://www.irs.ustreas.gov/pub/irs-mssp/fishing.pdf. (May 27, 2004).

Devens, John. 2004. Personal Interview. Valdez, Alaska. May 12. Division of Tourism. 1999. Alaska Visitor Industry Economic Impact Study.

Fineberg, Richard A. 2004. ExxonMobil Corporation, Its Alaska Operations and the 1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill: Background Report” Alaska Wilderness League.

Fineberg, Richard. 2004. Personal Interview. Fairbanks, Alaska. May 14.

Goldsmith, Scott, and Alexandra Hill. 1997 “Alaska’s Economy and Population, 1959-2002.”http://www.iser.uaa.alaska.edu/project/research/dotsho3a.htm. (June 1, 2004).

Lankard, Dune, and David Titcomb. 2004. Personal Interview. Cordova, Alaska. May 4.

Ott, Riki. 2004. Personal Interview. Cordova, Alaska. May 4.

Sustainable Economy Group. 2001. “A Market Sustainable Future.” http://www.akrdc.org. (April 15, 2004).

Weaverling, Kelley. 2004. Personal Interview. Cordova, Alaska. May 5.

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