The main threats to the polar bear are man-caused climate change and hunting. As EcoTourism Expert came to know, these findings were presented by the IUCN Species Survival Commission (IUCN / SSC PBSG) following an international session in Spitsbergen (Norway) on the conservation of the polar bear.
Summing up the work of 2018-2020, range states recognized the need for the world community to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in order to preserve polar bears and their habitat. According to experts, only quick, decisive and coordinated actions of all range countries can reduce the effects of climate change on the Arctic ecosystems and polar bears.
Other threats to the polar bear, according to experts, are conflicts between humans and bears, irrational hunting of polar bears in countries where hunting is permitted, oil spills, mining and development of minerals, pollutants, poaching, unregulated tourism, as well as diseases and parasites of the polar bear.
According to the Ministry of Natural Resources of Russia, in the period up to 2024, a complete account of the number of polar bear populations in the Russian Federation will be carried out for the first time in history as part of the national project "Ecology". In particular, in 2021, aerial surveys of polar bears will be carried out in the Chukchi and East Siberian seas, in 2022 in the Laptev and Kara Sea, in 2023 in the eastern Barents Sea and Franz Joseph Land.
The meeting in Spitsbergen was attended by representatives of the polar bear range states - the Russian Federation, Norway, Canada, Greenland and the United States of America.
In September 2015, the 10-year Circumpolar Action Plan (CAP), based on international cooperation, was adopted at a meeting of the range states of the polar bear to ensure the long-term conservation of polar bears in the wild.
An agreement on the conservation of polar bears of 1973 was concluded between the five Arctic countries of the range of polar bears. In addition, in 2000, an Agreement on the conservation and use of the Chukchi-Alaskan polar bear population was signed between the Government of the Russian Federation and the Government of the United States of America.
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