Using the most current data combined with computer simulation and statistical methods, experts have projects potential changes in polar bear numbers in relation to changes in sea ice.
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Geneva – Polar bears could see their numbers dwindle by almost a third by mid-century, a top conservation body said on Thursday, warning climate change poses the greatest threat to the king of the Arctic.
It said there was a high probability that “the global polar bear population will decline by more than 30 per cent over the next 35 to 40 years”, broadly reaffirming findings from 2008.
“Based on the latest, most robust science, this assessment provides evidence that climate change will continue to seriously threaten polar bear survival in the future”, IUCN chief Inger Andersen said in the statement.
The shrinkage in sea ice, which in September 2012 was the most severe since satellite records began, will make it ever harder for polar bears to catch seals that live on the ice, the report said. IUCN pointed out that a few parts of the Arctic are now expected to go beyond the five-month-ice-free threshold by the middle of the century.
Warming Arctic temperatures could also reduce the habitat and increase the chances of disease among the species polar bears prey on, including ice seals, the organisation warned.
“It is encouraging that polar bear range states have recently agreed on a Circumpolar Action Plan – the first global conservation strategy to strive for the long-term persistence of polar bears in the wild”. Polar bears spent 30 more days on land between 2008 and 2013 than they did between 1986 and 1995.
In both time periods, polar bears predominantly occupied sea ice, although land was used during the summer sea-ice retreat, and during the winter for maternal denning.
Other problems facing polar bears include pollution, exploration by people for resources such as oil, and changing habitats as a result of development.
The IUCN Red List now includes 79,837 assessed species, of which 23,250 are threatened with extinction.
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The status of polar bears will stay as “vulnerable” on the IUCN Red List – one of the world’s most comprehensive lists of the conservation status of different animals.
