Canadian Inuit got some help from an unlikely corner Thursday when the European Union rejected a motion to ban the international trade of polar bear parts.
The result assured the defeat of the U.S.-backed proposal.
"I think that's great," said Chucky Gruben, a polar bear hunter from Tuktoyaktuk, NWT "I'm glad to hear this was defeated."
The EU has angered the Inuit in the past over issues such as the seal hunt. But Thursday it was the union's 27 member states voting in a block at the 175-nation Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species that prevented polar bear skins from being placed in the same category as elephant ivory.
"It's basically the EU that stood in the way," said Teresa Telesky of Humane Society International, who is at the meeting in Doha, Qatar. "If it hadn't been for the EU, we would have won this debate."
If the motion had passed, it would have placed further obstacles in the way of the economically valuable sport hunt and prevented Inuit hunters from selling the skins of animals they kill for meat.
Mary Simon, head of Canada's national Inuit group Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, was pleased with the news but cautious.
"On first reaction, it's a very good sign for us," she said from Ottawa. "There is a possibility that the U.S. could come back to revise the rejected proposal and put it to a vote."
But Christine Eustis, a spokeswoman for the U.S. delegation, said that's unlikely. "We're not going to be bringing the polar bear up again," she said from Doha.
Canada, along with Norway and Greenland, led opposition to the U.S. proposal.
"There is no doubt that action must continue to ensure the conservation of polar bears. Canada's goal is long-term survival of polar bears," Canadian representative Basile Van Havre said. "But Canada does not think the proposal is supported by facts."
Canada is the only country that allows the export of polar bear hides.
Reports from those at the meeting suggest the EU voted against the motion because it judged that the real threat to the bears is climate change, not trade.
But the Americans argued that the sale of polar bear skins compounds the loss of the animals' sea ice habitat due to global warming. The U.S. Geological Survey suggests bear numbers - estimated at 20,000 to 25,000, with most in Canada - could decline by two-thirds by 2050 due to habitat loss.
However, other estimates, including those used by the global conservation watchdog Traffic International, suggest the decline will be 30 per cent. Projected declines would have to be at least 50 per cent over the next 45 years to require a trade ban.
The average annual export of 300 bear skins a year from Canada isn't big enough to threaten overall numbers, said Traffic - a conclusion echoed by environmental groups such as the World Wildlife Fund.
A CITES trade ban would not have blocked the export of hunting trophies. But it would have made it harder for hunters to bring them back south, because of an added layer of regulatory paperwork. That would have made the $30,000 excursions a tougher sell.
Losing the ability to sell skins would have been a blow, said Mr. Gruben. He explained a good skin can sell for up to $1,200 a metre, and the hides of just a couple of bears can subsidize snowmobile gas and equipment for an entire caribou-hunting season.
Canadian aboriginals, as well as territorial and federal governments, have long maintained Canada's polar bear hunts are well-managed. However, quotas in Nunavut's Baffin Bay area are being reduced in response to concerns from biologists, despite the objections of some hunters.
The Humane Society says trophy hunting and skin sales are an insignificant part of the overall Nunavut economy.
But Ms. Simon responds that the money is significant to those who earn it, especially since most live in communities with few other options to earn cash.
The debate won't go away soon. The Humane Society commissioned a poll this week suggesting that 82 per cent of Canadians favoured the trade ban.
Ms. Telesky said her group is likely to try again at the next CITES meeting three years from now.
"Our next step would be to bring it to the next meeting," she said. "We would anticipate that the U.S. would be interested in trying again."
The Canadian Press and The Associated Press