“This news arrived in my inbox. Just devastating news from the CITES convention for polar bears…who it seems are going to be left out in the cold!!! Watch the video then read the briefing below!!

Polar bears left out in the cold by CITES

Published on 7 Mar 2013 – Born Free

Will Travers, Born Free CEO, is saddened by today’s vote at the Bangkok meeting of CITES, which soundly rejected a proposal to increase protection from commercial trade for the polar bear, imperiled by the impacts of climate change.

This morning, the Conference of Parties to CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species) currently taking place in Bangkok, discussed a proposal by the United States asking for higher protection of the iconic polar bear (see video above).

This species, completely dependent on sea ice for survival, has seen its number s fall to around 20,000-25,000 in recent years. This has in part been caused by a dramatic decrease in the extent of both winter and summer sea ice (showing a reduction of up to 20%) over the past 30 years, exacerbated by hunting for domestic and international trade amongst other factors.

Found in just five countries in the circumpolar region (Canada, Denmark (Greenland), Norway, Russian Federation, and the United States), this species has caught the attention of the international community in recent years as the story of their decline has become common knowledge.

So, what will CITES Parties do to increase its protection and offer a life line to the world’s largest and best known bear species…WELL NOTHING!!!!

The precautionary principle, on which this proposal was largely based states that ‘where there are threats of serious or irreversible damage, lack of full scientific certainty shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective measures to prevent environmental degradation’.

So what this means is that if we are not sure of the effects an action is having, better to stop and reassess rather than proceed, possibly past the point of no return.

Today however, the Parties to CITES unfortunately threw precaution to the wind and voted not to increase global protection through greater trade restrictions despite the numerous current and ever looming threats to this species. It remains to be seen how this will contribute to the polar bear’s demise

News Link:-http://www.bornfree.org.uk/campaigns/bears/bear-news/article/?no_cache=1&tx_ttnews%5Btt_news%5D=1259

ENDANGERED POLAR BEAR

Uploaded on 2 Oct 2010

The things we do every day can greatly affect the environment.
Français :
http://www.lourspolaire.com/aiderlour…
http://www.naturavox.fr/climat/L-Ours…
http://www.planete-urgence.org/vous/e…

English:
http://www.savebiogems.org/polar/
http://www.adn.com/2010/06/26/1342804…
http://www.polarbearsinternational.or…
http://www.nationalgridfloe.com/
http://savingthepolarbear.org/
http://www.ehow.com/how_2285388_save-…

Polar bears are inquisitive, flexible and opportunistic, adept at exploiting their Arctic habitat.  Global warming is considered to be polar bears’ greatest threat and causes ice to melt earlier and freeze later. 

Bears have less time to hunt, have a longer summer fast and wait longer to resume hunting, causing loss of condition and potential conflict situations when hungry bears come in contact with people.  Meanwhile in captivity, intelligent and adaptable polar bears can suffer particularly badly in zoos, circuses and marine parks.

Polar bears are dying. As global warming accelerates, the sea ice they depend on for survival is literally melting away. Bears are starving and drowning as they have to swim farther and farther to reach solid ice. Some are even turning to cannibalism in a desperate search for food. Those trapped on land hundreds of miles from the nearest ice often wander near villages in search of food and are shot.

As if that weren’t enough, oil and gas drilling is destroying and polluting their fast-dwindling Arctic habitat.

A third of all polar bears — including all bears in Alaska — will be extinct by 2050 if current trends continue. The rest of the species will be gone by the end of the century.

But it’s not too late to save the polar bear if we join together and take immediate action. The science is clear.  We know what needs to be done — we just need to build the political support to do it.

Please sign the petition below to encourage President Barack Obama to rein in global warming and save the polar bear now.

Click the link below to sign the petition please:-

Petition & News Link:–http://www.savethepolarbear.org/

Global Ban On Polar Bear Trade Turned Down

Published on 7 Mar 2013

An international conference of 178 member nations of an environmental group opts to allow trading of polar bear parts to continue.An international ban on trade in polar bears has been banned because of fears it would distract from the bigger threat of global warming.
The proposal put to representatives of the 178 member nations of the Convention on International Trade In Endangered Species (Cites) had divided conservationists.
They all agreed that the main risk to the world’s largest carnivorous land animal came from habitat loss but differed over whether international trade also put the bears at risk of extinction.
Polar bears, widely seen as the animal on the front line of global warming, are predicted to be hard hit by melting polar ice caps.
But the debate at the Cites meeting in Bangkok focused on the additional threat to the species posed by international trade. “The polar bear is facing a grim future, and today brought more bad news,” said US delegation head Dan Ashe who warned the polar bear population could fall by two-thirds by 2050.
“The continued harvest of polar bears to supply the commercial international trade is not sustainable.”
The ban was rejected by 42 votes to 38, with 46 abstentions among the nations who participated in the poll in Bangkok – the proposal needed a two-thirds’ majority support to be passed.

Polar bears are prized for their skins – particularly in Russia – as well as other body parts such as skulls, claws and teeth and their are strict controls over their international trade.

About half of the roughly 800 polar bears killed each year end up in the international trade, mostly wild bears from Canada, according to expert estimates cited by the US.

The US, Canada, Russia, Denmark (Greenland) and Norway are home to a global population of 20,000 to 25,000 polar bears.

The WWF, which chose to oppose the ban in favour of concentrating on global warming said “habitat loss from climate warming, not international trade, is the primary driver” of an expected population decline.

Canada, which hosts the largest portion of the global population of polar bears and is the only country that still exports polar bear parts, opposed a ban, citing the need to preserve the traditions of the Inuit, an indigenous minority living mostly in the north of the country.

“The polar bear advances strong emotion. It is an iconic symbol of the Arctic,” said Canadian delegate Basile Van Havre.
Глобальный запрет на Polar Bear торговли Отклонен
ホッキョクグマ貿易に関する世界的な禁止が下がってい
全球北極熊的貿易禁止拒絕
Prohibición mundial de oso polar Comercio Rechazado
Proibição global de urso polar Comércio recusou

Please sign, Just a few on-line petitions to help save the polar bear:-

Protecting the polar bear, great links & facts:- http://animals.about.com/od/bears/a/polar-bear-protection.htm