Polar Bear Partnership

The plight of the polar bear is becoming critical. Climate change is taking a toll on polar bears and their habitat, endangering their long-term survival. We need to share the polar bears’ challenges and educate people on this growing conservation crisis. Here is our first step.

Polar Bears International® and the San Diego Zoo have formed an alliance to establish San Diego as the headquarters for a far-reaching conservation program called Arctic Ambassadors. Under the guidance of this program, zoos throughout the world will help educate and inspire millions of people by establishing Arctic Ambassador Centers.

PBI’s Arctic Ambassadors represent some of the world’s top leaders in polar bear education, research, and husbandry issues. As part of the alliance, the San Diego Zoo will manage the logistical operations of PBI’s highly successful Adventure Learning Program. This program includes PBI’s Leadership Camp in Churchill, Arctic distant learning initiatives, a world lecture series, interactive education, the annual Polar Bear Cam, and the launch of the 2008 Year of the Polar Bear. YPB will include a National Teen Contest, a teaching curriculum, polar bear tours with scientists, an online game, an interpretive center, and a Web-based education center.

The Zoo will become an active participant in PBI’s field research initiatives such as the Polar Population Project (Tri-P), which is designed to establish census counts in each of the 19 habitats, to track the movement of polar bears within those areas, and to determine the location of geographic pockets where the species might be able to survive the current period of climate change.

PBI and The San Diego Zoo will continue to work together on conservation driven research projects elucidating poorly-understood aspects of polar bear reproduction, sensory ecology, mother-cub behavior, and cub development, as well as how these systems are impacted by human disturbance and a changing environment. They will work to provide worldwide leadership in such polar bear husbandry issues as the elimination of stereotypic behavior, hair quality, nutrition guidelines, veterinary care, water quality, and other husbandry areas that will help maintain these lords of the Arctic as icons of the North.

PBI and the San Diego Zoo will work together to build an extensive network of Arctic Ambassadors to represent this sentinel species by inspiring, informing, and empowering change. They will create a team that will focus on the development of the leaders of tomorrow today, by utilizing the power of kids teaching other kids about the importance of the Arctic and conservation.

This Web site will provide updates on this project as we move forward. Visit us again for more information on the Arctic Ambassador program.