Montenegro established the Council for the management of the bear and wolf population

The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development has established a Council for the Development of Management Plans for the cultivation and use of brown bears and wolves in Montenegro. The establishment of the Council is the basis for the long-term and adequate management and protection of brown bear and wolf population in Montenegro, especially if it focuses on conservation and management in accordance with EU standards.

The Council was formally established in March 2019 and its establishment was initiated a year earlier through the project “Protected areas for nature and people” when in Podgorica, in March 2018, was organized the first international conference on the management of the brown bear population in Montenegro in WWF Adria – the World Organization for Nature Protection and Dinarides Parks – a network of protected areas of Dinarides, in cooperation with the German Nature Protection Foundation – EuroNatur, and the Centre for the Protection and Study of Birds.

The Council consists of 8 members and brings together all relevant civil society institutions and organizations that will jointly enhance the current management of brown bear and wolf populations and enable better co-operation with other countries in the region that share the same population. The Dinarides Parks and the Centre for the Protection and Study of Birds as initiators and active advocates of founding councils are also its members.

The main task of the Council is to coordinate and draft a Management Plan for bears and wolves and to develop Action Plans for each individual year, to prepare reports, to monitor the status of the population, and to establish and work an intervention team that should be established by the end of April this year.

One of the key tasks and obligations of Montenegro as a signatory to the Convention for the Protection of European Wild Species and Natural Habitats (Berne Conventions) is the creation, adoption and implementation of multi-year management plans for the brown bears and wolf population. This is also the preparation for the implementation of EU regulations that are one of the preconditions for Montenegro’s accession to the European Union.