“Families are disappointed. Businesses are disappointed,” Rep. Lori Idlout told CTV News Channel. “Water is such an essential human right.” Iqaluit, which reported a water shortage last week, is now working to get regulatory approval to draw water from a nearby lake. Joanna Quassa, Nunavut’s deputy minister of community and government services, said in a statement Friday that the federal government is “committed to working with the City of Ikaluit to ensure water levels meet the needs of Iqaluit residents in the coming winter”. Researchers assessing the ripple effects of water shortages have said it is urgent for the federal government to effectively respond to shortages with the required investments. “It is a human right to have access [water]sustainability researcher Kaylia Little told CTV News Channel on Sunday. “Not having access to enough water for an entire city, not just any city but the state capital, will have far-reaching effects across the region.” Little research has been conducted for the Arctic Institute on the water crisis in Iqaluit – focusing particularly on how water scarcity relates to Arctic infrastructure. “What we know is that the investments [towards water infrastructure] that have historically been created in the region have been much lower than those in the south,” he said. “Because of the unique nature of the climate and the need to ship materials, you actually have to double or triple the cost of building in the south. Instead of doing that, we’ve invested less and so the infrastructure is aging.” Climate change, he said, will also have an increased impact on the stability of existing water infrastructure. And he pointed out the complications with rebuilding that existing infrastructure. “Unfortunately weather and sea ice have a huge impact on the construction season,” he said. “These things are out of anybody’s control. But keeping that in mind and building early so that this winter while we can’t build, we can make those plans for next summer and make really big improvements.” Little said it’s the second time in about nine months that Iqaluit has had a water crisis, and said if the same situation happened in another capital “we’d be talking about it more and we’d see faster investment.” “We have to remember that this is part of Canada and we have to make the same investments that we make in places like Ontario and B.C. and make them in the north,” Little said. “And make sure these communities have exactly what they need to live a good life.”
