such a journey could take just twenty two days that woodson elash the transport costs that's almost twice as fast as a southern route through the mediterranean and across the indian ocean christopher parry is a strategic forecaster and former british naval officer he thinks disputes are unavoidable in the race for the arctic where i think we could have some disputes is there a number of other interested countries such as india china korea japan all getting very interested not just in the northern sea route but also in the resources that exists up there in the arctic already the chinese are operating in greenland to places like that and i think there will be a scramble by some of the other countries for some of those resources when the ice does recede to you're not just going to hurt the northern.