Romania Joins the Extermination of Bears

In Romania, a major battle has begun between wildlife defenders and bureaucratic officials who are trying to exterminate bears. Romania is the largest country in Europe, after Russia, in terms of bear population. Recently, the number of attacks has increased because predators are coming out in search of food towards people. Moreover, tourists are deliberately bringing this food to attract bears and film them! Also, like in Russia, bears are coming to garbage dumps and unprotected trash bins.

The main problem with bears in Romania is that authorities have started pitting livestock owners and farmers against wildlife defenders, claiming that the bears threaten livestock. Officials have taken a page from Russia’s playbook, where the inflated threat of predators to livestock is used to justify even more bear extermination.

The situation in Romania has reached a point where the authorities have started to significantly increase the number of bears that can be killed! They began issuing a critical number of shooting quotas: just this year, they increased the number of quotas by 50%. Now, some deputies are literally demanding that this number be doubled!

Officials angrily declare that bears are a threat to all living things, their numbers are growing, even citing data of 8,000 bears across Romania.

However, real experts immediately refute these numbers. Scientists say that the authorities use outdated methods to count the species, including repeatedly counting the same bears multiple times. Since no genetic tests are done, each bear can safely be added to the statistics multiple times, thus inflating the numbers on paper.

Many species of bears in Romania live a nomadic lifestyle, traveling long distances. Officials count these bears in every separate area. If a bear passes through ten areas, the report will state: '10 bears detected'. Scientists are now awaiting the results of a census using DNA to prevent bureaucratic officials from providing false data.

Let's get to the numbers! According to official data (which also could be false), between 2016 and 2021, 14 people were killed and another 158 were injured by bear attacks. Reports state that tourists are flocking to bears, bringing them sandwiches, and trying to feed them by hand to make videos.

The authorities brandish these numbers with cries of 'It’s time to kill the bears,' and bring various farmers and livestock owners to meetings, presenting them as victims.

For instance, they brought Tibor Fekete, who grazes about 70 cows on mountain pastures near the road to Saint Anne Lake. He publicly started calling for bears to be shot!

'Bears cause damage and endanger our lives,' he said. When wildlife defenders asked him why he didn't get guard dogs to protect his herd, the shepherd stated that keeping dogs is too expensive, and he doesn’t want to watch over them.

Incidentally, the shepherd is a 40-year-old, strong young man. This is not an old man who physically cannot watch over dogs to protect the herd! What our ancestors did since ancient times seems like an impossibly hard task to him.

Indeed, the cases of predators coming out of the forest have become more frequent. Similar to what we see in Russia, and it is no surprise: the problem is the same for everyone. And the reasons are the same, mainly hunger. When bears come out, and people start filming and throwing food at them, they provoke further exits from the forest.

A hungry bear, having once tried free food from a human hand, will definitely decide that it's safe! And rather than starving in the forest, they will think it’s better to go to humans again for some treats.

Recently, an incident occurred in a schoolyard in Miercurea-Ciuc, about 30 km from the city. A bear climbed a tree, frightened by people! Authorities, gleefully rubbing their hands, called an action group and ordered the animal to be shot.

After this, officials began actively using this case to justify 'clearing' the wildlife of bears, saying look, bears are trying to eat children in schools! And they urgently need to be exterminated.

Wildlife defenders are trying to address the problem. Similar to us in Russia, they say that conflicts between people and bears can be safely managed without stupidly exterminating predators. In the case of the bear, which climbed a tree in fright near a school, ecologists say it would have been far more appropriate to tranquilize it than to shoot it in front of children.

Do you know what the mayor of Miercurea-Ciuc, Attila Korodi, said in response? He stated that even after being tranquilized, a bear remains a bear and can attack a person.

By the way, Attila has held the post of Minister of Environment three times and has called for the total shooting of bears all this time!

His words reflect the level of degradation in the government system. Such 'cadres' manage the nature of a whole country and publicly call for exterminating predators because they are predators! If we follow his logic, all 'biting' animals should be exterminated because they have teeth and can always bite someone.

Attila Korodi's follower, recent Minister of Environment Barna Tánczos, also publicly calls for shooting bears in Romania. It is he who initiated the bill permitting the killing of 500 bears annually. According to him, if the law is not passed and mass shootings don’t start, bears will reach Romania's capital, Bucharest, and start devouring people in the city.

Currently, the core of the government is calling for mass bear shooting in the country with one goal: since 2016, trophy hunting of bears has been banned in Romania. The quotas issued for shooting are given to specialized services that 'reduce' the predator population. However, trophy hunters from around the world are still being kept at bay! But trophy hunting is big business! Romania keenly observes the implementation of sports hunting in Russia. Officials see how our 'managers' have flooded the market with bear meat, how long caravans of hunters from all over the world have traveled to Russia. They see the monopolization of the paid killing industry and enormous profits! And they want to monopolize their own wildlife areas.

Pure selfish interest.

Romanian wildlife defenders, our comrades, state this. They say the current bills promoted directly by top government officials essentially open the doors to trophy hunting. Ecologists claim that officials currently shoot bears that pose no problems at all! They deliberately distort facts and provoke bears out of the forest to use this as an excuse for mass shooting.

'We must understand that bears won't disappear from this area. But if a bear doesn't feel safe, it won't stay in the city,' says biologist István Imecs. He also criticized tourists for feeding bears, saying that by doing so, they help officials advance criminal laws. According to him, both foreign tourists and Romanians feed bears for social media video content.

A perfectly sound solution to the problem was proposed by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), which is labeled 'undesirable' and banned in Russia. WWF experts recommended that authorities install bear-proof trash containers, promptly clean up dumpsites around cities, and install electric fences around homes and trash bins.

Similar measures work perfectly well in Russia, but no one knows because it is not publicized. Authorities can only call for exterminating animals! In the Republic of Altai, on the shores of Lake Teletskoe, there's a village called Yailu where locals live side by side with bears. The village is surrounded by an electric fence, and all residents know how to behave around bears! They live responsibly, harming neither the bears nor humans.

This is also being locally tested in Romania with WWF's support. This was possible thanks to the small mountain town of Băile Tușnad, which aims to become a 'bear-oriented community.'

Here are the town's statistics: after 50 complaints about bear damage in 2021, by implementing all ecologist suggestions, the number of complaints dropped to ZERO in 2022 and 2023. Isn’t this effective management? Could this experience not be standardized to prevent conflict situations between humans and wildlife?

'Anyone in Tușnad who says they're not afraid of bears is either a liar or a fool. We've just gotten used to living together. There's no other way,' says a local resident.

This is the situation with bears in Romania. And it’s crucial that as many people as possible know about it! We must understand that the problem of bear extermination is observed not only in our country but worldwide.

Recently, I published photographs from a reader who sent us pictures from Karelia: they sell various 'delicacies' made from wild animal meat there. You can buy 'jerked' bear meat or even bear pâté.

The same happens across the country! The market is literally flooded with wild animal meat, with a third of all accessible forest lands now transferred to private hands for organizing sports hunting. A new monopolized business sector has emerged, extracting huge profits. The scariest part is that this is supported by people who gladly snap up 'wild meat.'

Meanwhile, the number of issued quotas for bear shooting grows annually in Russia! Authorities call for killing more and more. In 2021, authorities allowed over 28,000 bears to be killed; in 2022, over 31,000; and in 2023, the number of quotas exceeded 37,000.

© PAVEL PASHKOV