U.S. will push for ban on trade of polar bear parts

08.10.2012 [15:15]
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Baku, october 8 (AZERTAC). Faced with growing concerns about the hunting of polar bears in Canada, the Obama administration announced Friday it will again support a ban on the commercial trade of polar bears, whose hides fetch up to $16,000 each on the international market.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service released a position paper that advocates including the polar bear on the list of species that are subject to the most stringent constraints on international trade.

The effect of such a move, if adopted by the 176-nation Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora when it meets in March, would be to prohibit the sale of polar bear furs, claws, teeth and other body parts outside of Canada.

Hunts by aboriginal Inuits in Alaska and other polar states would still be allowed, but outside sale of the pelts would not.

The U.S. policy paper said the steady loss in recent years of sea ice — critical to polar bears who use it as a platform to hunt seals — already has placed the animals in a precarious position.

Though there are still up to 25,000 polar bears around the world, many of their populations are threatened and their numbers in many places are diminishing, the statement said.

U.S. will push for ban on trade of polar bear parts

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