Climate change is shifting spring forward in the UK, with insects on the wing and birds nesting earlier than they used to, a 50-year study has confirmed.

The research finds aphids, moths and butterflies are now flying and birds are laying eggs much earlier than in the mid-20th century, but how much of a shift there has been depends on where in the UK and which habitat they are in.

The researchers warned variations in how different groups of animals were shifting their behaviour means wildlife could get “out of sync” with the life cycles of other species they rely on for food.

Complex

It also suggests wildlife will not be protected in habitats such as woodlands, which it had been thought might provide more stable conditions that could be a “buffer” to rising temperatures.

The shift towards an earlier spring is also happening in shady forests as well as more open areas, the study into the seasonal habits of more than 250 UK species found.

Lead author Dr James Bell, who heads up the Rothamsted Insect Survey, said: “There was already good evidence that spring is coming earlier each year, but what we didn’t expect to find was that it was advancing as much in forests as it is in open areas such as grassland.

“Equally, in areas where we’d expect to see much greater acceleration, such as urban parkland, the rates of advance appear to be the same.

“This all points to a complex picture emerging under climate change, which makes ecosystem responses hard to predict, and even harder for conservationists to prepare for.”

Butterflies

He added: “The work is important because is shows us that we cannot rely on habitat to slow down climate change impacts, even in woodlands and forests where the conditions are more stable, and which were expected to buffer against adverse changes.”

The detailed picture built up by the study, which used data that stretches back to 1960, reveals that the responses by species to climate change are not straightforward.

Moths which turn from caterpillars to adults on the wing earlier in the year seem to be more responsive to climate change that those which change later, with moths that start flying before June now doing so much earlier.

In the north of the UK, changes in the climate may have different impacts on species, as butterflies become active earlier in the warmer wetter west than the colder drier east, but the opposite is true for birds laying eggs.

And birds and butterflies that live on farmland – as well as birds that live in coastal areas – are seeing later activity, suggesting that other factors such as a decline in available food are also in play.

The research – which also involved scientists from the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, the British Trust for Ornithology, Butterfly Conservation, and Science and Advice for Scottish Agriculture – was published in the journal Global Change Biology.

This Author

Emily Beament is environment correspondent for the Press Association. 

Firms are being urged to do more to tackle the impact of asbestos after a study found that 5,000 deaths a year are linked to past exposure to the cancer-causing material.

The Institution of Occupational Safety and Health (IOSH) said people were still being exposed to asbestos, 20 years after it was banned in Britain.

More than 130 companies or individuals have been ordered to stop work activities over the past year because of non-compliance with asbestos regulations, said an IOSH report. Asbestos is present in at least 500,000 buildings built before 1999, said the report.

Mesothelioma

Bev Messinger, the chief executive of IOSH, who will address an International Asbestos Awareness Conference in Washington DC on April 6, said: “It is unacceptable that 20 years on from asbestos being banned in Britain, organisations are still potentially putting at risk the lives of employees, their families and other members of the public.

“Courts fine some of the worst offenders, which causes significant commercial and reputational damage, but the human costs far outweigh the financial cost.

“Thousands die in Britain every year from cancers like mesothelioma, while many more are diagnosed with it. All this is preventable through good occupational safety and health. It is time for organisations to wake up and realise how dangerous asbestos is. There are no excuses.”

Vigilant

Dr Nick Hopkinson, medical director at the British Lung Foundation, said: “Breathing in asbestos dust can cause mesothelioma. Mesothelioma takes a long time to develop and people often get symptoms 30 to 40 years after exposure to asbestos.

“Currently the only treatments available are aimed at slowing the progression of the disease and improving quality of life.

“This devastating disease is preventable, and the dangers of asbestos are well known. This means it’s vital companies are vigilant and take the proper precautions to protect people from the life-threatening dangers of asbestos, and take urgent action if asbestos has been found.”

This Article

This article is based on a story from the Press Association. 

International plans to restore forests to combat global warming are flawed and will fall far short of meeting 1.5C climate targets, according to new research by UCL and University of Edinburgh scientists.

The study, published in Nature, reveals that almost half (45 percent) of the vast areas that countries have pledged are set to become plantations of commercial trees, a move which will seriously reduce expected carbon uptake and prevent agreements to curb climate change being met.

Simon Lewis, professor of Global Change Science at UCL Geography and lead author, said: “There is a scandal here. To most people forest restoration means bringing back natural forests, but policy makers are calling vast monocultures ‘forest restoration’. And worse, the advertised climate benefits are absent.

Forest restoration

“Plantations are much poorer at storing carbon than natural forests. To combat climate change, natural forest restoration is clearly the most effective approach. Well-managed forests can also help to alleviate poverty in low-income regions, as well as conserve biodiversity and support the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals.”

To meet 1.5C requires rapid emissions cuts andremoving carbon from the atmosphere. The international community is striving to restore 350 million hectares of forest, an area slightly larger than the size of India, by 2030, to do just this.

New calculations based on 43 countries’ restoration pledges show that only by allowing natural forests to return would sufficient carbon be captured for new forests to play their part in meeting global climate goals.

The 43 tropical and sub-tropical countries – where trees grow fast – have signed up to restoration commitments, many as part of the Bonn Challenge that aims to restore 350 million hectares of forest. Together, those countries, which include Brazil, India and China, have already committed to restore 292 million hectares of forest.

The study, which is the first in the world to compile and analyse country-level commitments for forest restoration, shows that land put aside for natural forests holds 40 times more carbon than plantations and six times more than agriculture that mixes trees and crops, known as agroforestry.

Emissions pathways

Using long-term carbon sequestration rates for natural forest, plantations and agroforestry, the researchers show that restoring natural forests over 350 million hectares of land removes 42 billion tonnes of carbon by 2100, whereas using current pledges for plantations (45 percent), natural forests (34 percent) and agroforestry (21 percent) applied to the whole area reduce this to 16 billion tonnes of carbon by 2100, assuming that all new natural forests are protected.

And if commercial monocultures were planted across 100 percent of the area just 1 billion tonnes of carbon is sequestered.

Countries differ vastly in their commitments. Vietnam represents the world’s largest commitment of new natural forests, at 14.6 million hectares; Brazil has pledged 19 million hectares of new plantations; Nigeria has the most agroforestry, 15.7 million hectares.

Dr Charlotte Wheeler, from the University of Edinburgh, and a co-author, said: “The reason plantations are so poor at storing carbon is that they are harvested every decade or so, meaning all the carbon stored in the trees goes back into the atmosphere, as the plantation waste and the wood products – mostly paper and chipboards – decompose.

Natural regeneration

“Instead, restoring all 350 million hectares back to natural forests can meet the role forests need to play under Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change emissions pathways that keep global warming to 1.5C.

“Of course, new natural forests alone are not sufficient to meet our climate goals. Emissions from fossil fuels and deforestation must also stop. Other ways to remove carbon from the atmosphere are also needed. But, no scenario has been produced that keeps climate change below dangerous levels without the large-scale restoration of natural forests.”

The scientists recommend that the definition of ‘forest restoration’ excludes monoculture plantations, and propose four ways to increase carbon capture from today’s forest restoration schemes.

Firstly, increase the proportion of land being regenerated to natural forest; second, prioritise restoration in Amazonia, Borneo and the Congo Basin, which support very high biomass forest compared to drier regions; third, build on existing carbon stocks by targeting degraded forests for natural regeneration; and fourth, once natural forest is restored, protect it.

This Article

This article is based on a press release from University College London.

An estimated 15,000 young people took to the streets to demand action on climate change last month. 

But the sustainability and environmental issues that so clearly motivated these young protesters are not sufficiently reflected in the curriculum they are taught at school, according to one headteacher. 

Richard Dunne, headteacher of Ashley C of E Primary School in Walton on Thames, has responded by writing a Teachers’ Guide, which he hopes will help schools develop curricula inspired by Nature. This, he says, will better equip students to take on the environmental challenges threatening their future wellbeing – and the wellbeing of all life on Earth.

Environmental challenges

Dunne said: “If there’s one thing the Youth Strike 4 Climate protesters have taught us, it’s that there is a growing and vocal group of young people who care deeply about the future of our planet. 

“It’s time for educators and policy makers to hear the clear message from these young people and to develop for them an education that prepares them to engage with – and take the lead on – the sustainability and environmental challenges we all face.”

Published by The Harmony Project, Harmony: A New Way of Looking at and Learning About Our World (A Teachers’ Guide) sets out in detail what a curriculum inspired by Nature could look like.

It is a curriculum that Richard Dunne has developed and rolled- out, alongside staff at the Surrey school, over the last five years. Now others are following suit. 

The publication of the book comes at a critical point for school leaders. In September 2019, Ofsted’s new framework for inspection, which places greater emphasis on the design and delivery of the curriculum taught in schools, comes into force.

Richard Dunne added: “The new focus on intent, implementation and impact in the draft framework requires schools to consider in more detail not just what they teach, but how and why they teach it.

“Schools have a fantastic opportunity to create purposeful, contextualised and environmentally-aware curricula that are adapted to their students and to their geographical settings.” 

This Article 

This article is based on a press release from The Harmony Project.

Image: Cade Martin, Pixnio. 

Extinction Rebellion (XR) seemed to have fallen into relative quiet since it burst into existence at the end of 2018 the environmental action group.

But plans have been hatching during these months of relative silence. On 15 April XR will renew its booming demands for government action on climate change with an International Rebellion. 

Groups from across the country will descend on the capital to engage in acts of nonviolent civil disobedience in hopes of averting ecological catastrophe. Thousands will begin their journey on the morning of the 15th, and there are also those who are taking a little more time to make their way there.

International rebellion

Individuals from various corners of England and Wales will spend the weeks leading up the International Rebellion walking together to London, in what have been dubbed Earth Marches.

A group beginning in Land’s End set off more than a month early, with at least 50 people starting their epic walk on 11 March. This is just one of the 16 counties who have organised walks, with over 1000 members nationally. 

Ness Woodcock-Dennis has been organising the walk beginning in Colchester on 9 April. The team living the ancient capital will be joined by fellow walkers along the way as well as cyclists from Norwich.

Ness, 45, a public health nurse and educator at the University of Essex, sees the march and subsequent protests as an opportunity to raise public awareness of climate change. She hopes it will urge the government and media – increasingly dominated and distracted by Brexit – into acting and telling the truth on the dire situation the planet faces.

Ness said: “Climate change and the effect this has on our health and the health of our children is an emergency and should be treated as such by our government, who have chosen to ignore robust research. Our government, along with governments around the world need to act now to legislate if we are to avoid ecological disaster.”

Social support

Other walkers from Colchester include a community volunteer working with vulnerable people and children’s play therapist. All have taken time off from their jobs to take part in the walk which will cover an average of 10 miles a day.

As well as raising awareness the walkers will be litter-picking as they make their way to London. They will document the amount of rubbish they collect along the roadsides and footpaths to highlight the human impact on ecosystems.

Despite some negative responses to the walkers already set off from Cornwall, the majority of the interest in the Earth Marchers has been extremely positive.

Ness said: “We have had overwhelming support from people in our communities who are offering us food, drink and rest along our way.” The social cohesion created between the walkers and the communities they come in contact with is an important part of Regenerative Culture, a cornerstone of XR’s approach to direct action.

The Earth March demonstrates the strong social supports it is possible for groups to create as well as emphasising an alternative, more pensive approach to modern life, but this does not mean that they intend to go about their demands quietly.

Join in 

Ness explained: “On arrival in Westminster, we want to make our concerns heard. We are the people government are employed to serve.”

To be part of the Earth March for any distance, join the Facebook group and find out if there are already walks planned near your area.

This Author 

Liz Lee Reynolds is a freelance writer focussing on place and the environment. She tweets @LizzieeLR.

The first hearing on corporate climate change denial at the EU level saw experts give testimony on the history and political impact of the issue, as well as the role oil and gas company ExxonMobil has played in misleading policy-makers and the public.

MIT/Harvard climate science historian Dr. Geoffrey Supran told Parliamentarians: “I have only shown you the tip of the iceberg,” and presented ExxonMobil as “one cog in a well-funded, well-oiled denial machine.”

However, the company’s absence at the hearing will likely have unpleasant consequences for its lobbyists. Similar to Monsanto when it refused to follow a parliamentary summons for a hearing, ExxonMobil may be directly reprimanded by MEPs: a set of rules established in 2017 makes it possible to revoke the parliament access badges of any company ignoring a summons.

Deliberate misinformation 

Taking away the EU Parliament’s accreditation of the corporation’s in-house lobbyists would be a first step to free EU climate policy from the decades-long stranglehold of the fossil fuels industry, and send a strong signal to other companies. ExxonMobil has spent over €35 million since 2010 to lobby the EU and protect its lucrative business interests,

More and more MEPs are backing the civil society organisations demanding ExxonMobil be stripped of its lobby badges.

Food & Water Europe and Corporate Europe Observatory, and Friends of the Earth Europe are working to raise more awareness of the necessity to keep fossil fuel corporations as far away from climate and energy policy-making as possible, ahead of the next meetings of the EU Parliament’s Conference of Presidents, where such decisions are made. 

Frida Kieninger of Food & Water Europe, and official parliamentary petitioner, said: “Parliamentarians at today’s hearing learned just how dangerous and omnipresent deliberate misinformation about the grave climate impact of fossil fuels really is.

“We still have a small window of opportunity to stop absolute climate chaos, so it is only logical to start by shutting out any corporation misleading policy-makers and the public.

“MEP Molly Scott-Cato announced that the process to strip ExxonMobil of its lobby badges will start today. This action is welcomed, and a necessary first step.”

Demanding action 

Pascoe Sabido, Corporate Europe Observatory, said: “ExxonMobil’s well-funded EU lobbying shows that the company has moved from denying climate change to delaying and weakening climate action.

“But looking at the havoc global warming is already wreaking in many parts of the world, the impact is equally devastating. The EU Parliament must show Exxon and the rest of the fossil fuel industry the door, no matter how deep their pockets.

“Millions of young people are taking to the streets to demand determined climate action, but do MEPs accept the challenge?

This Article 

This article is based on a press release from Food & Water Europe.

Right of Reply 

Richard Scrase, media adviser at ExxonMobil, said: “We…believe that market-based systems that place a uniform, predictable cost on greenhouse gas emissions are more effective policy options than mandates or standards. Market-based policies more effectively drive consumer behaviour and technology innovation, while mandates and standards limit consumer choice and can perpetuate ineffective technologies.”

Have you ever set out for a day at the beach only to come across a wall of rubbish  blocking the entrance?

That was exactly what happened this week with the ones intending to enjoy Ipanema Beach, in Rio de Janeiro.

The sign in front of the wall said: “One day, the trash left on the beach will stop you from getting into it”.

Protecting the sea 

The wall was built with plastic trash removed from only three days of garbage left on the beach of Ipanema and aims to draw attention to the fight against maritime pollution caused by plastic in the oceans.

By 2050 there will be more plastic than fish in the sea, according to Ellen MacArthur Foundation and the World Economic Forum. This wall stood five meters in length and two meters high.

The stunt was part of global a partnership between beer brand Corona and NGO Parley Of The Oceans that aims to protect the sea from plastic garbage.

This Article

This article is based on a press release from Soko. 

The International Civil Aviation Organization is dismissing factual critiques and blocking accounts that raise concerns about the climate change impact of flying.

A number of campaigners and researchers complain they have been barred from following the International Civil Aviation Organization (Icao) account, after posting messages about aviation emissions.

Icao’s combative approach to public engagement has drawn wider criticism, with environmental journalists describing it as “spectacularly ill-judged” and “self-defeating“.

Airspace

On Wednesday, Steve Westlake, a behavioural scientist at Cardiff University, shared a screenshot showing Icao had blocked him. It came after he responded to three Icao tweets by sharing a comment from Swedish teen activist Greta Thunberg arguing most airport expansions were incompatible with meeting international climate goals.

That analysis is uncontroversial. Aviation is one of the fastest growing sources of greenhouse gas emissions. The sector’s emissions target, negotiated in Icao, is not aligned with the Paris Agreement, which calls for global warming to be held at 1.5C or below 2C.

A few hours later, Icao tweeted a poem declaring “spam, fake news or plain abuse/fall outside our terms of use”. In response to critics, it insisted: “We don’t want to reduce activists’ focus on #aviation emissions. We in fact encourage it. For it to be effective, it should be fact-based and well-targeted. Abuse, spam, and misinformation are not helpful to anyone.”

Other users to fall foul of Icao’s social media account include British academic Kevin Anderson, who champions a moral case for flying less, and Vincent van Oort, who described Icao’s carbon offsetting scheme as “weak” and called for “fair taxation” to reflect the sector’s environmental impact.

It is not just climate campaigners: user Pierre-Yves Baubry appears to have been blocked for asserting that Taiwan controlled its own airspace, not Icao member state China.

Emissions

Asked to explain the policy, Anthony Philbin, head of communications at Icao, told Climate Home News: “Normally we block campaigners after they have repeatedly ignored our advice that the actual decisions regarding their concerns are being made by sovereign nation states.

“There is a common tendency among persons not familiar with multilateral governance to identify the decisions made through Icao as being ‘Icao’s decisions’, and to subsequently direct criticisms at our organisation for being somehow negligent or irresponsible regarding the targets and outcomes countries decide on together here.

“I’m sure you can understand that such misperceptions and false accusations can be unduly damaging to our reputation as an effective multilateral agency.”

Westlake said he had had no such advice or counterargument from Icao before he was blocked, nor had he posted on their timeline before.

Icao is the forum for countries to regulate emissions from aviation. Its member states agreed in 2016 to cap net emissions at 2020 levels. That is set to be largely achieved by airlines paying for emissions cuts in other sectors, to offset their growth.

The details of the carbon offsetting scheme are being negotiated largely behind closed doors. Earlier this month, campaigners welcomed a decision to prevent double-counting of emissions savings, but warned the process was vulnerable to industry capture and weak environmental integrity.

This Article

This Article first appeared on Climate Home News.   Republish this article. 

Sitting in the offices of Koch Industries in Washington D.C., far-right Australian politician Steve Dickson shows his hand in a request for their cash.

“This lefty attitude that just thinks solar and wind are going to change the world for the better … it’s sending us all broke,” Dickson, the Queensland leader of the political party One Nation, told Koch Industries director of federal affairs Catherine Haggett.

The exchange with the petrochemical giants, from September 2018, is part of a blockbuster hidden-camera investigative series released by Al Jazeera.

Socialism fears

Dickson and senior One Nation figure James Ashby traveled to the United States, to try and solicit millions of dollars in donations, and promise this could help the party gain a balance of power and then weaken Australia’s gun laws.

The two-part Al Jazeera investigation took years to compile. The broadcaster used an actor and journalist to set up a public-facing, but fake, Australian gun rights lobby group. Then journalist Rodger Muller of the fictitious “Gun Rights Australia” facilitated a One Nation trip to the U.S., accompanying Dickson and Ashby to multiple meetings, conferences, and lavish dinners events.

The conduct of the One Nation representatives was revealed just a week after 50 people were gunned down in two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand. An Australian far-right extremist is accused of carrying out the massacre.

Young people

There is no evidence that One Nation was able to secure any money from its U.S. trip.  Just months later the Australian Senate, where One Nation leader Pauline Hanson has a seat, voted to ban foreign political donations. Ashby is Hanson’s chief of staff.

Koch Industries billionaire owners Charles and David Koch have pumped their influence, and their millions, into a wide network of libertarian and conservative lobby groups and think tanks that push climate science denial, promote fossil fuel use, and block climate-friendly policies.

In the meeting, Ashby complains that Australia is “turning socialist” before Haggett adds: “We are too, and when you look at the data of young people and how they perceive socialism, it’s terrifying.”

She adds: “We are not naive to the importance of politics in Australia and how they relate to the U.S.”

One nation’s denial

The Al Jazeera series has already had major political ramifications for One Nation, with Australia’s Prime Minister Scott Morrison saying his conservative Liberal Party will ask voters to place One Nation candidates below key rivals Labor on voting papers in the upcoming national election, expected in May.

One Nation’s far-right policy platforms include banning Muslim immigration and exiting the global Paris climate change agreement. The party considers human-caused climate change to be unproven.

Conspiracy theories

The Al Jazeera documentary also caught Hanson discussing Australia’s Port Arthur massacre — a 1996 mass shooting in Port Arthur, Tasmania, where 35 people were murdered with an assault rifle.

The massacre was the catalyst for Australia’s National Firearms Agreement that included a ban on semi-automatic and automatic weapons.

But Hanson is heard suggesting the shooting could have been a political or government conspiracy, pointing at the “accuracy” of the shots.

Hanson told Muller that before the shooting, “An MP said it would actually take a massacre in Tasmania to change the gun laws in Australia.”

“Haven’t you heard that? Have a look at it. It was said on the floor of parliament. I’ve read a lot and I have read the book on it, Port Arthur. A lot of questions there … those shots, they were precision shots.” Ashby adds: “It’s that whole September 11 thing too,” without elaborating.

Massacre

When Donald Trump won the 2016 U.S. Presidential election, Hanson joined former One Nation senator and climate science denier Malcolm Roberts to drink champagne in front of Parliament House in the Australian capital.

“We will free the world of this rubbish they call climate change,” said a jubilant Malcolm Roberts. Roberts would later leave the Senate after it was discovered his British citizenship should have disqualified him from standing.

With them drinking champagne was American climate science denier and blogger Tony Heller, who had been in Australia with Roberts.

Heller has also suggested a conspiracy behind the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in Connecticut, where 20 children and six adults were killed.

One Nation in D.C.

In December 2016, Roberts traveled to Washington, D.C., to meet with a who’s who of climate science denial, including Heller.

Several of the people Roberts met, work at Koch- and fossil fuel-funded think tanks, including Patrick Michaels of the Cato Institute, and Myron Ebell of the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

In the first episode of the Al Jazeera investigation, National Rifle Association bosses coach the One Nation representatives on how to react to mass shootings. One NRA public relations figure advises the response should be: “How dare you stand on the graves of these children to put forward your political agenda?”

At a press conference, Hanson attacked the “Islamist” outlet Al Jazeera, and said One Nation would not have engaged with the NRA or Koch Industries had it not been for Muller’s approaches.  She said footage had been heavily edited, taken out of context and accused Australian media of being biased against her.  “Journalism ethics are on the line today,” she said. She added her views on Port Arthur were that a lone gunamn was responsible, and said that man should have been given the death penalty.

Hanson confirmed her chief of staff James Ashby and lead Senate candidate for Queensland, Steve Dickson, would both remain.

Her only previous statement had come in a Tweet, where Hanson said: “I was shocked & disgusted with the Al Jazeera hit piece. A Qatari government organization should not be targeting Australian political parties. This has been referred to ASIO. After the full hit piece has been released I’ll make a full statement & take all appropriate action.”

This Article

This article first appeared at Desmog.uk.

ClientEarth is challenging decisions by Poland’s General Directorate of Environmental Protection (GDEP) to license culls from free herds in the Borecka and Knysznska forests, in the country’s north east.

European bison are at risk of extinction and the law does not allow the deliberate killing of these endangered animals.

At the end of 2018, the general director granted two forest inspectorates permission to carry out the culls before the end of March this year. In both cases, arguments used to justify the decision raised serious scientific and legal doubts, but officials have so far ignored calls from environmentalists to rescind their approval, according to ClientEarth.

Legal challenge

It is unknown how many bison have already been culled as the forest inspectorate has refused to provide the lawyers with these details, they said.

ClientEarth lawyer Agata Szafraniuk said: “The general director of environmental protection may allow a derogation from this ban only in exceptional cases, justified beyond any doubt, only in the absence of alternative solutions. In our opinion, the December decisions do not meet the above criteria.

“We want to make sure that these and subsequent decisions to cull bison are taken in accordance with the law and latest scientific knowledge.”

The GDEP’s justification of the decisions included stating that animals were in poor condition or they lacked a fear of people – claims that lawyers have questioned.

ClientEarth decided to take the case to court, arguing that the culling permits were issued in a way which prevented the public from taking part in the decision-making process.

Systematic problem 

According to the law, the GDEP should immediately inform the public about receiving the applications for bison culling permits. The public and interested groups would then have a chance to present arguments against the culls.

The GDEP did not do this and only published final culling permits half a year later. This effectively prevented the public from engaging in the process. Due to this delay, ClientEarth lawyers were therefore denied participation in the proceedings and their applications for reconsideration of the permits were rejected.

Szafraniuk added: “Unfortunately, such culls are a symptom of a systemic problem. Regular killing of several dozen animals each year has sadly been a key element of the way bison have been dealt with for some time now. What’s worse, it’s being undertaken without any transparency or accountability.

“The public must not be denied the right to be involved in such decisions. Decisions concerning the management of the European bison population in Poland need to be made in a transparent and reasonable manner.”

The largest land mammal in Europe, the European bison has come close to extinction, with just 54 individuals recorded at one point early last century. After decades of breeding efforts, there are now around 2,000 bison living in free-ranging herds and closed breeding centres in Poland.

This Article 

This article is based on a press release from ClientEarth.