Communities across Japan are confronting a spike in dangerous encounters with wild bears, prompting local governments and wildlife agencies to take measures that officials acknowledge are both unprecedented and controversial. CBS News coverage of the problem highlights an array of responses — from stepped-up authorized killings and live captures to technological deterrents such as drones and new electric fencing — as authorities scramble to protect residents and farmland.

The surge in encounters reflects long-term structural changes. Japan’s population is among the world’s oldest, with roughly 29 percent aged 65 or older, and many rural areas have seen accelerated depopulation and abandoned agricultural land. As fields and orchards revert to forest, bear habitat expands and foraging patterns shift. Poor mast years for acorn-producing trees and warmer winters, linked by researchers to climate variability, have reduced natural food supplies and pushed bears closer to villages in search of calories. Those dynamics increase the frequency of potentially lethal encounters with the two main species in Japan: the Hokkaido brown bear and the Asiatic black bear on Honshu and other islands.

Local governments face difficult trade-offs. Emergency culling and capture operations are expensive and politically sensitive but are presented as immediate tools to reduce risk. Deploying drones to haze or monitor bears is a less lethal tactic now being tested in several prefectures, and municipalities are investing in strengthened electric fences, night-time patrols and compensation programs for farmers who lose crops. These measures carry direct fiscal implications: many rural municipalities operate under tight budgets while confronting a rising operational burden for wildlife management, emergency response and compensation payouts.

The economic consequences extend beyond direct government costs. Frequent high-profile bear attacks can depress rural tourism and disrupt harvests for specialty crops that underpin local incomes. For aging communities where one or two farms can dominate employment and cultural identity, even modest increases in risk translate into outsized economic and social pain. Analysts warn that without integrated policy responses, the problem will recur and possibly worsen as forests continue to encroach on former farmland and as climate patterns alter food availability for wildlife.

Policy debates are sharpening around prevention versus reactive control. Conservationists and some municipalities favor long-term landscape management — restoring hunting and monitoring capacity, maintaining active agriculture to deny habitat expansion, and investing in public education and early-warning systems. Others argue that immediate public-safety needs justify lethal control of problem animals and rapid deployment of deterrence technologies.

The bear issue in Japan underscores a broader global pattern: aging societies with shrinking rural workforces face mounting human-wildlife conflicts as land-use patterns shift. How Tokyo and prefectural governments allocate resources — balancing emergency measures, subsidies to sustain rural livelihoods, and investments in habitat and climate resilience — will determine whether the recent spike in deadly encounters becomes a prolonged crisis or a catalyzing moment for wider rural policy reform.