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Province protects polar-bear habitat

Critic says it's token move as area isn't threatened with development

By: Bruce Owen

9/12/2009 1:00 AM | Comments: 3

PETER DEJONG / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Enlarge Image

To highlight the impact of climate change on polar bears, a life-sized sculpture of a polar bear has been carved out of a nine-tonne block of ice in the centre of Copenhagen and left to melt. According to the World Wildlife Fund in November, all of the Arctic’s summer ice will disappear within 20 years, having a devastating effect on polar-bear communities, which live on ice all year round. You can watch the Copenhagen sculpture melt on this live video: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthvideo/6727083/Copenhagen-climate-summit-ice-bear-sculpture-livevideo. html

Premier Greg Selinger will land in Copenhagen this weekend for climate-change talks armed with a bunch of last-minute announcements designed to beef up Manitoba's green credentials.

On the heels of cutting a $31-million cheque for a new Arctic exhibit and polar-bear research centre at Assiniboine Park Zoo, he will announce today his government is to set aside a huge part of the Hudson Bay coastline and lowlands as a protected area.

The vast area, known as the Kaskatamagan Sipi and Kaskatamagan Wildlife Management Areas, is home to polar bears, beluga whales, bearded seals and ringed seals, numerous bird species and coastal caribou.

Selinger declined to comment on the plan in an interview Monday, but said he's been asked to speak at the Copenhagen Climate Conference about what's happening in Manitoba to protect polar bears. Selinger and Conservation Minister Bill Blaikie fly to Copenhagen at the end of the week.

Selinger said Manitoba intends to be the world leader when it comes to understanding the impact of climate change on polar bears.

"One of the key protected areas in the North is an area of polar-bear habitat," he said. "They will have their natural environment protected for the future.

"Their population has been declining over the last several years. We want to ensure that they survive and thrive."

Additional protection come under recent changes to the province's Wildlife Act.

The use of vehicles and buildings--including tents--in the Kaskatamagan Wildlife Management Area has been prohibited. Hydroelectric exploration or development and logging have also been banned.

Manitoba has also listed the polar bear under its Endangered Species Act. It's also upgrading a holding facility for the bears in Churchill as more bears are being put in the compound this fall because ice on Hudson Bay was late in forming.

In the past month the plight of the polar bear has gained international recognition with disturbing images of a larger male bear eating a small cub being printed in newspapers and circulating on the Internet. The photos were taken in the Churchill area this fall. Experts say there has been a higher number of reports of cannibalism this fall as hungry male bears have not been able to go out onto the ice of Hudson Bay to hunt seals.

Environmentalists welcome the increased protection, but say it also shows how much more of the province has to be protected from development, including mining.

"A cynical person would look at this and question what kind of threat this area was facing that it needed to be protected from?" Wilderness Committee spokesman Eric Reder said. "There are no roads, no commercially viable forests to harvest, not a great deal of interest from the mining industry. Is this is token announcement to pad the government's numbers on protected areas?"

Reder also said protection of the polar bears deflects attention from what the government isn't doing to save its wild spaces.

"Selinger's polar-bear announcement is a feel-good story. Is there any real opposition to this plan? Any controversy? No, so it's an easy decision to make. It's good politics. It's not really environmental-protection progress."

bruce.owen@freepress.mb.ca

Go online, watch the bear melt away

You can watch the Copenhagen sculpture melt on this live video.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthvideo/6727083/Copenhagen-climate-summit-ice-bear-sculpture-live-video.html

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition December 9, 2009 A4

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3 Comments

Posted by: joecanadian

December 9, 2009 at 10:50 AM

Grubfoot, you have no view of the big picture. Right now being "Green" is a strong in terms of soft power. It's good for business and it's good for the economy. Anything that makes Manitoba look like an environmentally concious competitive business environment is good for attracting foreign investment and immigrants.

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Posted by: Grubfoot

December 9, 2009 at 8:07 AM

"Selinger declined to comment on the plan in an interview Monday, but said he's been asked to speak at the Copenhagen Climate Conference about what's happening in Manitoba to protect polar bears."

Who asked Selinger to speak at Copenhagen? Why would a conference of national representatives care what a provincial premier says? Did the request even come from overseas or was it made from within Manitoba, from within his party, or even from within his office? He won't raise welfare rates but, man, the polar bears have got $31M to blow on seal meat. It is so typical of the NDP to cater to the activist minority.

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Posted by: The Answer is Always Right

December 9, 2009 at 7:07 AM

Can't one of these people read another point of view. They got on this train and want to force up our taxes, a tax to breath now, and spend money doing something they can't do anything about. It's time to do more research, after those other fraud artists were exposed.