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Social and Behavioral Sciences
Climatic change; Elias Kleist; Fisheries; Great Salinity Anomaly; Greenland; Human dimensions; North Atlantic Oscillation; Paamiut; Sisimiut; Unaami
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West Greenland's Cod-To-Shrimp Transition: Local Dimensions Of Climatic Change, Lawrence C. Hamilton, Benjamin C. Brown, Rasmos Ole Rasmussen
West Greenland's Cod-To-Shrimp Transition: Local Dimensions Of Climatic Change, Lawrence C. Hamilton, Benjamin C. Brown, Rasmos Ole Rasmussen
Sociology
Abstract
West Greenland's transition from a cod-fishing to a shrimp-fishing economy, ca. 1960-90, provides a case study in the human dimensions of climatic change. Physical, biological, and social systems interacted in complex ways to affect coastal communities. For this integrated case study, we examine linkages between atmospheric conditions (including the North Atlantic Oscillation), ocean circulation, ecosystem conditions, fishery activities, and the livelihoods and population changes of two West Greenland towns: Sisimiut, south of Disko Bay, and Paamiut, on the southwest coast. Sisimiut prospered as a fishing center through the cod-to-shrimp transition. Paamiut, more specialized in cod fishing, declined. Their stories …