Murmansk Region
Indigenous land use and dependence on the environment
The fundamental subsistence of the rural Saami, as well as Komi and Nenets, is reindeer breeding. Tundra pastures are used during the summer, and forest tundra pastures during the winter. Pastoralism (organised in brigades) is far more sedentary today, with shift-work on the pastures. Although traditional reindeer sledges are still in use for local transportation, shift-workers use snow scooters and off-road vehicles to and from the pastures.
The
Kola Peninsula
fed approximately 78,000 domestic reindeer in 1996. Presently, only the pastures to the east of the industrial strip along the
Kola
River
are in use. Summer pastures in the border regions could provide a basis for over 20,000 reindeer, and have temporarily been used by Saami reindeer breeders from
Norway. The
lack of usage by Kola reindeer in this area has recently lead to negotiations between the region’s administration and foreign companies about selling parts of the land for industrial purposes.
Salmon fishing in rivers and other inland fishing has subsidiary importance, but is presently difficult to carry out to a significant extent, because the salmon rivers, especially the most productive Ponoy River, are leased to foreign tourist entrepreneurs. Other rivers are in areas unlawfully controlled by the armed forces that deny permission and violently sabotaged attempts to establish indigenous commercial fishing activities during the 1990s.