Kitikmeot Region


Kitikmeot Region is an administrative region of Nunavut, Canada. It consists of the southern and eastern parts of Victoria Island with the adjacent part of the mainland as far as the Boothia Peninsula, together with King William Island and the southern portion of Prince of Wales Island. The regional centre is Cambridge Bay.
Before 1999, Kitikmeot Region existed under slightly different boundaries as Kitikmeot Region, Northwest Territories.

Transportation

Access to the territorial capital of Iqaluit is difficult and expensive as there are no direct flights from Kitikmeot Region communities to Iqaluit. For example, Iqaluit is approximately from Kugaaruk, the closest Kitikmeot community. A one-way flight to the capital costs between $3,000 and $4,000 and involves flying to, along with an overnight stay in, Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, approximately southwest of Kugaaruk—in total, a trip of about.
As is the case for the rest of Nunavut, there is no road access to the region and all places are fly-in. All five hamlets have certified airports: Cambridge Bay Airport, Gjoa Haven Airport, Kugaaruk Airport, Kugluktuk Airport and Taloyoak Airport, with scheduled flights by Canadian North.
There are also four registered aerodromes in the region. Cambridge Bay Water Aerodrome is a floatplane base open in the summer only. George Lake Aerodrome, an ice runway is only open from January to April, and serves the Back River Gold Project. Goose Lake Aerodrome also serves the Back River Gold Project and has both ice and gravel runways. Hope Bay Aerodrome serves the Hope Bay mine site and is a gravel runway. The former Doris Lake Aerodrome, was a ice runway, and was the longest in the region, it served the Doris Lake mine.

Climate

The Kitikmeot Region has a harsh subarctic climate and a tundra climate with long, very cold winters and short, cool summers.

Politics

The region is home to the only two communities in Nunavut that voted "no" in the 1982 division plebiscite: Cambridge Bay and Kugluktuk.
The region has four electoral districts;
Former districts include Akulliq, which covered Kugaaruk and Naujaat in the Kivalliq Region. It was the only electoral district in Nunavut to cross two regions. Nattilik, which covered Gjoa Haven and Taloyoak was held between 2004 and 2008 by Leona Aglukkaq, who went on to win the 2008 Canadian federal election for the electoral district of Nunavut and became the Minister of Health and then the Minister of Environment in the federal government.
In 2007 at their AGM, Bobby Lyall, a board member of the Kitikmeot Inuit Association and younger brother of Bill Lyall, suggested the formation of a political party called the Bloc Kitikmeot to run in the next general election and to advocate for a separate Kitikmeot Territory. Bobby Lyall, along with his brother Kitikmeot Corporation president, Charlie Lyall and delegates Martina and Connie Kapolak, argued that the Government of Nunavut had spent most of the infrastructure money available from the federal government in the Baffin Region. However, the party was not formed and consequently no members ran for a seat in the Legislative Assembly of Nunavut which continues to run as a consensus government.

Communities

Hamlets

There are five hamlets in the region:
  • Cambridge Bay population: 1,760
  • Gjoa Haven population: 1,349
  • Kugaaruk population: 1,033
  • Kugluktuk population: 1,382
  • Taloyoak population: 934

    Other

There are three other census subdivisions in the Kitikmeot:
  • Bathurst Inlet population: 0
  • Umingmaktok population: 0
  • Kitikmeot, Unorganized population: 0

    Protected areas

  • Ovayok Territorial Park
  • Northwest Passage Territorial Park
  • Kugluk/Bloody Falls Territorial Park
  • Queen Maud Gulf Migratory Bird Sanctuary
  • Wrecks of HMS Erebus and HMS Terror National Historic Site

    Demographics

In the 2021 Canadian census conducted by Statistics Canada, the Kitikmeot Region had a population of 6,458 living in 1,677 of its 1,954 total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of 6,543. With a land area of, it had a population density of in 2021.
The Kitikmeot Region also doubles as one of three census divisions in Nunavut, the others being the Kivalliq and the Qikiqtaaluk regions. Of the three the Kitikmeot is the smallest in size being smaller than the Kivalliq. It has the smallest population and is the least densely populated of the three. The population is predominantly Inuit with 0.5% other Indigenous peoples, 0.2% North American Indian and 0.3% Métis, and 10.2% non-Indigenous.