In October, members of the Belfer Center’s Arctic Initiative joined more than 2,000 Arctic policymakers, scholars, business leaders, and residents in Reykjavík, Iceland, for the Arctic Circle Assembly—the world’s largest annual gathering on Arctic issues. The Arctic Initiative delegation of students presented innovative ideas for Arctic resilience. 

The Arctic Initiative at Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center and the Polar Institute at the Woodrow Wilson Center hosted Iceland's Minister of Foreign Affairs, Gudlaugur Thór Thórdarson, for an engaging Earth Day dialogue on sustainability.  

As the Arctic continues to transform due to a changing climate, Minister Thórdarson discussed the critical role the Arctic Council will continue to play in promoting collaboration on the issues of sustainable development and environmental protection across the Arctic and beyond. The collaboration is also essential to global security. 

As numerous studies have made strikingly clear, climate change is increasing much more rapidly than anticipated and its negative impacts are becoming more and more visible around the world. From the escalating extremity of weather events, severe droughts and wildfires, to melting glaciers, rising sea levels, and disastrous floods, climate change is already harming humans and our ecosystems in a myriad of ways. 

Twenty-four Harvard Kennedy School students recently returned from the Arctic Circle Assembly in Reykjavík—the world’s largest annual gathering on Arctic issues—where each presented her or his innovative and interdisciplinary solution to an Arctic challenge. These “Arctic Innovators” are part of Harvard Kennedy School’s Arctic Initiative, which is co-led at the Belfer Center by John P. Holdren, Henry Lee, and Halla Logadóttir.

Across the Arctic, rapid climate change is taking its toll. Melting ice and sea level rise are threatening entire communities. Areas rich in oil and gas are opening up to exploration, but the economic benefits often do not reach Arctic populations. For many, life in the Arctic is becoming more difficult each day.

For Halla Hrund Logadóttir, the challenges posed by rapid climate change in the Arctic truly hit home. Growing up on her grandparents’ sheep farm in Iceland, Logadóttir could see the crags of a massive glacier on the horizon. While sheep grazed on sloping volcanic fields of emerald green grass, she learned to drive tractors and fix engines. Today, she’s using that hands-on experience to protect the world’s most fragile ecosystem.

During his keynote address at the 2017 Arctic Circle Assembly in Reykjavík, Iceland on October 13, John P. Holdren announced the establishment of The Arctic Initiative: Science, Technology, Education, and Policy Innovation for a Sustainable Arctic at Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center. The Arctic Initiative is a joint project of the Belfer Center’s Environment and Natural Resources Program (ENRP), headed by Henry Lee, and the Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program (STPP), co-directed by Holdren, who led  the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and served as President Obama’s Science Advisor from January 2009 until January 2017.