Evolving Landscapes: The Impact of Climate Change on Indigenous Foods in Russia’s Far East

Shifts in climate and land usage could greatly transform the types and access to traditional wild foods in the vast Russian Far East, an area inhabited by numerous Indigenous Peoples who rely on these natural sustenances.

Wild plants, animals, and fungi gathered from nature in these territories are essential for the health and economies of people living in remote and rural locales. However, these traditional food systems is increasingly under threat from climatic changes and land development. Yet, there is limited knowledge regarding the actual role wild traditional foods play in supporting rural households or how upcoming environmental changes might jeopardize these vital resources.

An international research team led by Associate Professor Jorge García Molinos from the Arctic Research Center at Hokkaido University has conducted a survey in rural Indigenous communities in the Republic of Sakha to explore their utilization of wild traditional food and assess the potential future impact of climate and land-use changes on these food systems. Their findings have been released in PNAS Nexus.

The survey involved 400 households across 18 rural communities in Sakha, gathering information on demographics, eating habits, and income-related activities such as hunting, fishing, and foraging for traditional wild foods.

The analysis of the collected data indicated varying levels of reliance on wild food sources throughout the region. Settlements in the more developed and accessible central and western parts of Sakha displayed notably lower consumption levels. In contrast, communities in the remote northern Arctic region had significantly higher intake levels. In these Arctic settlements, residents primarily relied on wild fish and mammals, while rural households in southern and western regions tended to consume more plant-based foods like berries and nuts.

A similar trend was noted regarding economic reliance on wild food sources. In one northern settlement, wild foods—mainly mammals—constituted about 11 percent of total household income, whereas in a central settlement, this figure dropped to approximately 3 percent, primarily deriving from berries.

The researchers utilized species distribution models to forecast changes in the availability of 51 wild food species under various climate and land-use scenarios. This involved mapping anticipated changes both regionally and locally, considering areas within a 100-kilometer radius of the surveyed communities, which would likely be the zones for harvesting those wild foods.

The modeling suggested an overall decline in the number of species by 2050 in the southern parts of the Republic of Sakha, with slight increases in the northern regions as species adjust their distributions in response to environmental changes. Locally, these wider regional shifts imply that the types and availability of food species accessible to specific settlements may change in the future.

For instance, some species like moose are expected to extend their range into the northernmost Arctic areas, potentially offering new food and economic prospects for those communities. Conversely, species such as blackcurrant, wild onion, and lingonberry in central and southern areas are anticipated to witness significant decreases in habitat suitability, likely leading to their unavailability in some settlements in these regions, especially under the most extreme emission scenarios.

“While our models indicate that local losses could be offset by the emergence of new species that improve in their habitat conditions, understanding how these shifts in the availability of local wild food species will affect rural communities in the future remains an important question that merits further investigation,” states García Molinos.