Nenets

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NENETS

The Nenets are the most numerous of Russia's northern peoples, numbering about 35,000, and one of the most northerly. Their homelands stretch along the Arctic coast, from northeastern Europe to the Taymyr Peninsula. Most Nenets are concentrated in the Nenets Autonomous District and the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous District. Much of their territory is tundra; and their economy, based on large-scale reindeer pastoralism, has been the main adaptation to this harsh environment. The Nenets language belongs to the Samoyedic branch of the Uralic languages. Language retention among Nenets is higher than among most other northern peoples, due to the remoteness of their settlements and their continuing nomadism.

Western Nenets have a long history of contact with Russians, some paying tribute to Novgorod by the thirteenth century, and to the Tatars shortly thereafter. As Russians began to colonize Siberia in

the mid-seventeenth century they met occasional fierce resistance from Nenets groups. They also incorporated Nenets into state-building projects, resettling some to Novaya Zemlya in the nineteenth century, in an effort to ensure sovereignty over those islands.

The Soviets began to establish reindeer-herding collective farms in Nenets territory in 1929. Repression of wealthy herders followed, as did the confiscation of their reindeer and the general sedentarization of children, elderly, and some women. Nenets opposed such moves in several uprisings, which the Soviets quelled, then covered up. However, given the minimal prospects for developing this part of the Arctic, the Soviets generally encouraged the continuation of traditional Nenets activities.

Nenets homelands are particularly rich in oil and gas deposits. As technology improved by the latter twentieth century, making exploitation of these resources viable even given the harsh Arctic clime, development ensued. The greatest challenges for the Nenets became the construction of gas wells and pipelines across their reindeer pastures. Reindeer herds at the beginning of the twenty-first century exceeded pasture carrying capacity, and pasture destruction due to hydrocarbon development has exacerbated this problem. Development also encouraged massive in-migration into Nenets homelands by non-Nenets peoples. In post-Soviet years, these gas-rich areas experienced less out-migration than other northern areas.

Since the demise of the Soviet Union, Nenets have actively pursued their rights, creating regional Nenets organizations for this purpose. Reindeer-herding leaders have established ties with herders in Finland, Sweden, and Norway to pursue complementary agendas of economic development and environmental protection.

See also: nationalities policies, soviet; nationalities policies, tsarist; northern peoples; siberia