The Nenets, also known as Samoyeds, are a Samoyedic ethnic group native to Arctic Russia, Russian Far North. According to the latest census in 2021, there were 49,646 Nenets in the Russian Federation, most of them living in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug, Nenets Autonomous Okrug and Taymyrsky Dolgano-Nenetsky District stretching along the coastline of the Arctic Ocean near the Arctic Circle between Kola and Taymyr peninsulas. The Nenets people speak either the Tundra or Forest Nenets languages. In the Russian Federation they have a status of Indigenous small-numbered peoples. Today, the Nenets people face numerous challenges from the state and oil and gas companies that threaten the environment and their way of life. As a result, many cite a rise in locally based activism.

Taymyr Dolgano-Nenets Autonomous Okrug was a federal subject of Russia, the northernmost in Siberian Russia. It was named after the Taymyr Peninsula. It was also called Dolgan-Nenets Autonomous Okrug, by the name of the indigenous people Dolgans and Nenets.