The Circumpolar Action Plan (CAP) is a 10-year cooperation plan between the Range States that aims to strengthen their efforts in polar bear conservation. The plan was adopted in 2015.
At the biennial meeting of the Polar Bear Agreement in Greenland in 2015, the Range States adopted the CAP with the goal to foster and strengthen international cooperation to conserve polar bears across their range. The CAP builds on each country’s national efforts and aims to lead to more efficient and effective use of conservation resources.
The vision of the CAP is to secure the long-term persistence of polar bears in the wild that represents the genetic, behavioral, life-history, and ecological diversity of the species.
Seven key threats are identified in the CAP; of these human-induced climate change and the effects of such changes on habitat and prey is considered the primary threat. The other threats include human-caused mortality; mineral and energy resource exploration and development; contaminants and pollution; shipping; tourism-related activities, and disease.
The vision of the plan is supported by seven objectives (six objectives were defined in the 2015-2025 CAP adopted in 2015 and one additional objective was defined in the 2020-2023 Implementation Plan). The objectives are to:
- minimize threats to polar bears and their habitat
- communicate to the public, policy makers, and legislators around the world the importance of mitigating greenhouse gas emissions to polar bear conservation
- ensure the preservation and protection of essential habitat for polar bears
- ensure responsible harvest management systems today that will sustain polar bear subpopulations for future generations
- manage human-bear interactions to ensure human safety and to minimize polar bear injury or mortality
- ensure that international legal trade of polar bears is carried out according to conservation principles and that poaching and illegal trade are curtailed.
- carry out coordinated circumpolar population research and monitoring to monitor progress toward achieving the vision of the CAP
The CAP contains strategies and actions geared towards meeting these objectives by 2025. At each Range State biennial meeting, a periodic implementation plan is adopted, where a set of actions from the CAP that are to be implemented in the following 2-3 year interim are identified.
Half way through the implementation of the 10-year CAP, in 2020, the Polar Bear Range States undertook a mid-term review to evaluate the degree to which the actions have been implemented, the effectiveness of actions to achieving the stated objectives, and the impact of those actions toward achieving the vision. The mid-term-review identified a set of circumpolar actions linked to the seven objectives, and the Circumpolar Action Plan Implementation Team (CAP-IT) developed a detailed Plan for the period of 2020-2023.
The full text of the CAP adopted in 2015 and the Mid-term-review report from 2020, as well as appendices and annexes, can be downloaded in the sidebars of this page.
