A delegation from the Inuit Circumpolar Conference plans to meet Mandela during this week's negotations to reduce or eliminate 12 POPs under a globally binding treaty.
POPs build up in the fat of game animals such as polar bear.
Delegates from more than 120 countries are in Johannesburg for the last of five scheduled negotiating sessions on a POPs treaty set up by the United Nations Environment Program. POPs are toxic, long lasting, and travel in multiple cycles of evaporation, transported by air and condensation to remote areas far from the source of release. Communities like Iqaluit in Canada's far north are particularly vulnerable to POPs. In the cold climate of the Canadian Arctic, low evaporation rates trap POPs, allowing them to enter the food chain. They build up in the fat of game animals like polar bear, walrus and seals, staples of the Inuit diet.