POND INLET, N.W.T. - Eric Ootoovak poses for photos next to his day’s kill—a Narwhal whale—before carving a slice of skin and fat called maktaaq that he devours with happy dispatch.

Maktaaq, pronounced "muktuk," is the sushi of the North, a delicacy that drives Inuit hunters each spring to the edge of the retreating ice to claim their yearly quota of whales.

Ootoovak, 21, will take more than 250 pounds of maktaaq from this whale, selling what he doesn’t keep for himself for $4 a pound at the local co-op. "It’s like candy," he says of the soft, rubbery treat. The meat is eaten raw, or fried, and virtually everyone in this community of 1,200 relies on it to supplement the expensive "southern food" they buy from the co-op. (Most items cost twice what they do in the south.) Rich in vitamin A, protein and the fatty acids that prevent heart disease, maktaaq has been a vital part of Inuit diets for generations. It has allowed the Inuit to thrive in harsh conditions where fruit and vegetables are scarce.

But the maktaaq from today’s marine mammals threatens to impair the development of Inuit children. Every mouthful now comes laced with alarming levels of PCBs, DDT, mercury and other toxic chemical pollutants that originate in the south.

Negotiations toward a global agreement to control the substances began last week in Montreal. A treaty is not likely to be concluded before 2000. Studies conducted by Canadian scientists show the Inuit in traditional hunting communities like Pond Inlet now have PCB levels as high as any on Earth. The chemicals are passed to babies through placenta and breast milk.

The long-term effects of PCB poisoning are not fully understood. Recent studies in the Great Lakes, where PCB levels are lower than in the Arctic, suggest chemical accumulation in humans can damage the neurological development of children, leading to memory, learning and attention-span difficulties. The chemicals can also suppress the immune system in a developing fetus, making it more susceptible to infection.

Meanwhile, the recent discovery of hermaphrodite polar bear cubs in Svalbard, Norway, has heightened concern that the chemicals may also be disrupting hormonal development. For his part, Ootoovak says he’s aware of the poisonous additives in maktaaq, but shrugs at the potential consequences. "You worry about it, but there’s nothing you can do," he says. A piece of maktaaq no larger than a sugar cube contains more than Health Canada’s maximum recommended intake of PCBs for an entire week.

But many local residents, like hunter and guide Lameck Kadloo, 34, will consume 10 times that much in a single day. It’s an unhappy fact that the more these communities adhere to their traditional way of life, the more potentially harmful pollutants they expose themselves and their children to. Kadloo’s three young children all eat maktaaq as a regular part of their diets. "It’s part of our tradition," he says. "We can’t give it up just like that. We have to eat what the land gives us."

PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls) are man-made chemicals once widely used as insulators in electrical equipment. If burned or improperly disposed of, PCBs evaporate into the atmosphere and travel on prevailing northerly winds to the Arctic. There, they hit frigid air and condense out of the atmosphere in what is essentially a massive and continual distillation process.

The chemicals have infected much of the Arctic food chain, with the greatest concentrations being recorded in longer-living animals like whales and polar bears. The chemicals reside in the fat of these creatures.Officials with the department of Indian and Northern Affairs are sensitive to the predicament of traditional communities when issuing health warnings in the North. "It’s not a straightforward yes or no, eat it or don’t, kind of perspective that we offer," said Russell Shearer, an environmental scientist with the federal government’s Northern Contaminants Program. "We fully recognize the tremendous value traditional foods have to Northern communities, from both an economic and nutritional view, which can’t be substituted. So it’s a very delicate situation, weighing the benefits and the risks."

Federal officials have recently issued warnings directed at pregnant mothers and women of child-bearing years, recommending they cut down their consumption of whale and seal maktaaq, which have the highest concentrations of PCBs. Officials recommend young women stick to less-contaminated country food like caribou or fish. Contamination levels of wildlife relate largely to the animals’ feeding habits, with predators having higher levels than plant or plankton eaters.

A federal report in the early 1990s estimated that the average Inuk in Northern Canada annually consumed about 232 kilograms of meat and fat from Arctic animals. Inuit have a very low rate of cancer and have virtually no heart disease; scientists believe it’s the result of their hearty consumption of fish and sea mammal. "It’s a difficult matter now balancing risks and the benefits," said University of Laval scientist Eric Dewailly. "We don’t want to scare people from eating local food because it is still the best for them, even though it’s somewhat contaminated."

The first phase of the Northern Contaminants Program identified the magnitude of the Arctic pollution problem and the reasons behind it.  Phase two of the program, launched in April, involves a five-year, $30 million study to assess the impact of persistent organic pollutants (POPs) on the people of Canada’s Arctic. Mr. Dewailly, one of those involved in the project, said the major focus of his research is the fetus. Until now, virtually no work has been done in the North to determine whether PCB levels in mothers and their babies are actually resulting in more birth defects or developmental problems.

Some of the only research comes from food contamination disasters in Asia. In Japan and Taiwan, hundreds of people were exposed to PCB-contaminated rice oil in 1968 and 1979 respectively. Children born to women up to seven years after the incidents showed developmental delays and behavioural problems. Mr. Dewailly is the scientist who accidentally uncovered the PCB contamination problem among the Inuit in the mid-1980s. He went to the Arctic seeking a pristine control group for use in research about PCB levels in the breast milk of mothers in southern Quebec; he was astounded to find PCB levels among Inuit mothers five times higher than women in the south. Mr. Dewailly is now tracking the development of infants in Northern Quebec and Greenland and expects to report his findings in 2001. In the meantime, the Canadian government is leading an international effort to reduce the production and release of the 12 most toxic industrial compounds, including PCBs. Even though production of the most toxic chemicals has been banned in Western countries like Canada, the situation in the Arctic has not improved over the past decade because there are other, persistent sources. Some of the PCBs in the Arctic come from local, contaminated DEW Line (Distant Early Warning) radar sites, but most travel on prevailing air and water currents from Asia and Russia. (ENDS)