Victoria Qutuuq Buschman has a Dr. of Conservation Biology researching how Indigenous communities contribute to Arctic biodiversity conservation, including wildlife management and the development and establishment of protected areas.
Originally from Alaska and Northern California, she now lives in Greenland where she focuses on circumpolar perspectives on wildlife management and the establishment and development of protected areas.
Victoria has always known she wanted to be a biologist and was interested in learning about the ecological, biological, cultural, and policy foundations of Arctic conservation efforts in order to understand how western conservation approaches can better respond to Indigenous communities.
She thinks the Arctic Rivers Project helps change the narrative by inviting Indigenous communities to dictate and shape the research at hand. Victoria highlights the importance of partnering climate modeling with Indigenous knowledge, especially on ecological systems, with risk-perception in scenario-selection in order to create relevant and informative climate information for Indigenous communities, climate researchers, and policy analysts.
Victoria emphasizes the importance of an Indigenous worldview in conservation and how it is critical to recognize and embrace this Indigenous “way of being” in research perspectives on the fight against climate change.Her holistic approach to conservation research and policy and her passion for amplifying Indigenous voices are what the Arctic Rivers Project is trying to emulate in our work, specifically in the development of storylines of change.