Troops are being sent to the north of Japan to help contain a surge of bear attacks, which have killed at least 12 and injured more than 100 since April.
Bears have shown up near schools, train stations, supermarkets, and even a hot springs resort, with attacks by the animals reported almost daily across Japan, mostly in the north.
‘Every day, bears intrude into residential areas in the region and their impact is expanding,’ deputy chief cabinet secretary Fumitoshi Sato told reporters. ‘Responses to the bear problem are an urgent matter.’
The Defence Ministry and Akita prefecture signed an agreement on a troop dispatch today, allowing soldiers to set box traps with food inside, transport local hunters and help with the disposal of dead bears.
The soldiers will not use firearms to cull bears, officials said, despite Akita governor Kenta Suzuki saying local authorities were ‘desperate’ for manpower.
Defence Minister Shinjiro Koizumi said the bear mission aims to help secure people’s daily lives, but that the Self-Defence Force (SDF) service members’ primary mission is national defence.
In Akita prefecture, which has a population of about 880,000, bears have attacked more than 50 people since May, killing at least four, according to the local government.
Experts say 70% of the bear attacks have occurred in residential areas.
An elderly woman who went mushroom-hunting in the forest was found dead in an apparent bear attack over the weekend in Yuzawa City in the prefecture.
Another elderly woman in Akita city encountered a bear while working on a farm and was killed in late October.
A newspaper deliveryman was attacked by a bear and suffered an injury in Akita city on Tuesday.
Experts say Japan’s ageing and declining population in rural areas is among the reasons for the growing bear problem in recent years.
Abandoned neighbourhoods and farmland with persimmon or chestnut trees often attract bears to residential areas.
Once bears find food and acquire a taste, they keep coming back, experts say. Local hunters are also ageing and not used to bear hunting.
Experts say police and other authorities should be trained as ‘government hunters’ to help cull the animals.
The government set up a task force last week to create an official bear response by mid-November.
Officials are considering bear population surveys, the use of communication devices to issue bear warnings and revisions to hunting rules.
The lack of preventive measures in the depopulated and ageing northern regions has also led to an increase in the populations of brown bears and Asiatic black bears, the ministry said.
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