Sun, 27 May 2012
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Many in the Danish territory want Greenland to achieve full independence but is the Arctic island really big enough to be entirely self-sustaining?
In the Danish government's entourage in Copenhagen, there are also doubts about whether the island could survive on its own, even if its economy were to receive a major boost from the potential oil and mineral riches believed to be buried under its icecap.
Some observers, including Nuuk University lecturer Pia Vedel Ankersen, claim Greenland's population is too small to meet the challenges posed by independence and its necessary economic growth.
"Greenland could be independent tomorrow if it could do without the 4.0 billion kroner it receives from Denmark (537 million euros, 756 million dollars in annual subsidies plus costs for defence, police and judiciary covered by Copenhagen), which represented about a third" of Greenland's gross domestic product of some 12 billion kroner in 2008, said Ankersen. "To deprive themselves of that today would mean society would collapse, and even the most vehement advocates of independence would not accept a throwback to the misery of the past.”
Only an independent economy based on oil and mineral revenues could realise this dream of independence without too many sacrifices, she added.
But even at that, independence could only be a reality "in 50 years," according to Ankersen, unless Greenland chose "other more rapid routes, such as joining the European Union which it withdrew from in 1985 to protect its fishermen or by forming an alliance with the United States. A choice like that could speed up the process and the EU option is the most appropriate, since Greenland could benefit from the EU's structural funds.”
However, said Ankersen, a "completely independent Greenland is an illusion."
Even Denmark with its 5.5 million inhabitants is "dependent on the European Union and its cooperation with other countries," she said.
Prime Minister Kuupik Kleist echoes that view.
Photos credit: jtstewart
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