Saami. The Surrounding Society and the Main Economic Activity of the Region of Residence

The Kola Saami area of residence combines highly urbanized areas with an oasis of traditional reindeer herding.

The Murmansk region is one of the strategic regions of the country in the Northwestern Federal District. The largest port and the only ice-free deep-water harbor in the Russian Arctic, Murmansk is the main base of the Northern Sea Route and the Northern Fleet (military, nuclear icebreaking, commercial, trawl, and sea fishing), an outpost of Russian geopolitics in northern Europe, as well as the center of the fishing industry of the Barents region. The Kola Peninsula houses bases of the Russian Northern Fleet. The bases are closed administrative-territorial entities and are subordinate to the Ministry of Defense: Severomorsk, Vidyaevo, Zaozersk, Ostrovnoy, and Aleksandrovskoye with the cities of Polyarny, Gadzhievo and Snezhnogorsk.

Rooted in the Pomeranian fishing practices, the Murmansk fishing industry covers the waters from the Atlantic to Novaya Zemlya, specializing in catching and processing cod, haddock, sea bass, crab, catfish, black halibut, pollock, flounder, capelin, and others.

The commercial semi-oceanic and river species include salmon, pink salmon, trout, whitefish, grayling, smelt, ruff, and other species. Processing and preservation of fish is provided by a whole range of plants on the Kola coast.

The Murmansk region provides almost a sixth of the whole commercial fish production in Russia (Murmansk Fish Processing Plant, one of the largest in the country, has been operating since 1932). The navigable waterways are the basis of the Murmansk communications system. River transport does not exist on the Peninsula since the rivers are short and full of rapid currents.

The Kola Peninsula is one of the most developed mining regions of Russia, fulfilling most of the country's demand for phosphate ores, phlogopite, vermiculite, zirconium raw materials (baddeleyite), niobium, tantalum, and rare earth metals. The mineralogical depository of the Khibinу, including the largest apatite deposit and a number of deposits of rare metals, discovered in the early 1920s by the expedition headed by Alexander Fersman, determined the definitely industrial development of the area. Nowadays the network of the mining and mining processing industry includes the following entities: the “Apatit” mining and processing plant (based in Apatity, Kirovsk, and specializes in the production of phosphate raw materials), the Kandalaksha Aluminum Plant (Kandalaksha, specializes in the production of primary aluminum), the Kola Mining and Metallurgical Company (Monchegorsk, Zapolyarny, Nickel, specializes in the production of nickel, refined copper, and sulfuric acid). Others include the Olenegorsk mining and processing plant (Olenegorsk, the production of iron ore raw materials), and the Kovdorsky mining and processing plant (the production of apatite, baddeleyite, and iron ore concentrates.)

The modern mining industry has expanded. There are offshore oil rigs in the Barents Sea, and one of the largest gas fields in the world, the Shtokman gas field, is being explored, too.

The transport network is formed by a railway line (built on the eve of the Revolution, in 1916-1917), connecting St. Petersburg, Petrozavodsk, and Murmansk, with branches to Severomorsk, Nikel, Zaozerny, Monchegorsk, Kirovsk, Kovdor, and Alakurti.

In the Lovozero municipal unit, reindeer herding and livestock farming coexist with mining operations. Around 50% of the land fund of the area (19% of the territory of the Murmansk region) is allocated to reindeer pastures. The largest share (90%) of the Kola reindeer population is part of the agricultural production complexes “Tundra” (Lovozero) and “Olenevod” (Krasnoschelye, Kanevka, Sosnovka), which have reindeer herds of 24-25 thousand heads each. The remaining 10% comes from the communities and farms that use reindeer in the tourism industry. The total number of reindeer in the region as of January 1, 2017, amounted to 50.001 heads (“Tundra” with 24.26 heads, “Olenevod” with 25.741), and as of January 1, 2018 – 50.177 heads.

Landscape and climatic features of the region (proximity of tundra, forest-tundra and taiga, white nights, and aurora borealis), its huge cultural and historical potential combined with transport accessibility and relative proximity to St. Petersburg and Moscow contribute to the development of tourism. The tourism business is becoming a sizable part of the economy and one of the main directions for the development of small businesses, including those provided by ethnic communities. The tourism industry (fishing, rafting, sports, hiking, and ethnographic tours) brings up to 200 thousand people to Lovozero per year. Some people come from China and Thailand, and show a particular interest in seeing aurora borealis and fishing (according to the local residents, foreign tourists “take pictures with every fish they catch”). Lovozero is believed to be the residence of the Saami Father Frost (Mun Calla).