World Marine Mammal Protection Day is celebrated on 19 February each year. The day was established to raise awareness of the need to conserve and protect marine mammals such as cetaceans, pinnipeds and polar bears.

Rosneft is committed to environment-oriented campaigns and biodiversity preservation activities. The Company’s activities are based on the principle of preserving a favourable environment and biodiversity in all regions of its presence. Protecting and studying marine mammals is one of the key focuses of Rosneft’s environmental programme.

A key element of the programme involves conducting research on the grey whale population of the Sea of Okhotsk. This population is one of the smallest and most vulnerable to extinction, and it is listed in the Red Book of the Russian Federation. Since 1997, Rosneft has been participating in the monitoring programme for the grey whale population in the Sea of Okhotsk. The programme involves annual population counts, observation of animal behaviour, study of their food sources, photo identification research and acoustic monitoring.

As part of their research, experts concluded that the annual growth rate of the grey whale population in the Sea of Okhotsk is around 5%. In 2025, the total number of whales registered in the programme’s photo catalogue reached almost 400 individuals.

Until the 1990s, the grey whale population in the Sea of Okhotsk was considered to be completely extinct, with the species being classified as on the verge of total extinction. In 2019, the Russian Ministry of Natural Resources included the species on the list of rare and endangered animals requiring urgent restoration and reintroduction measures. In 2020, the Sea of Okhotsk population of grey whales was included in the Red Book of the Russian Federation.

In addition, the Company is supporting environmental monitoring of the Okhotsk-Korean population of grey whales on the north-eastern shelf of Sakhalin Island. Each year, specialists conduct photo identification, population counts and studies of the food supply and behaviour of mammals. As part of the study of the Okhotsk-Korean grey whale population, a unique acoustic monitoring programme is being carried out. This involves recording and analysing levels of natural and anthropogenic underwater noise. These studies facilitate the examination of sound and its propagation.

Rosneft is an active participant in the Interdepartmental Working Group under the Russian Federation’s Ministry of Natural Resources, working to ensure the conservation of the Okhotsk-Korean grey whale population. The working group develops proposals for legislation on population management and coordinates the interaction of interested federal and regional executive authorities, businesses, scientific organisations and the public.

In 2020, Rosneft, together with the Shirshov Institute of Oceanology of the Russian Academy of Sciences, implemented a large-scale project to study and monitor dolphins in the Black Sea. The results of the three-year study provide up-to-date, relevant data on the numbers and preferred habitats of Black Sea dolphins and their seasonal dispersal patterns. Guidelines have been developed for the study and conservation of dolphins.

Rosneft is also committed to studying and preserving the polar bear population. Since 2014, the Company has been conducting expeditions to study polar bears. In 2024, Rosneft initiated a new four-year cycle of research as part of Tamura, its corporate programme for preserving the biodiversity of Arctic ecosystems. In 2025, Rosneft, in collaboration with Innopraktika, a non-governmental development institute, launched an online course of popular science lectures entitled “Arctic Wanderer: The Polar Bear.”

Since 2015, Rosneft has also been researching the size and characteristics of the Atlantic walrus population. During this period, studies were conducted in the Nenets State Nature Reserve and in the Kara and Laptev Seas. As part of the national Ecology project, significant research into walruses in the Barents Sea has been conducted. Rosneft has facilitated the inaugural survey of the Franz Josef Land archipelago.

Department of Information and Advertising
Rosneft Oil Company
February 19, 2026

Keywords: Environmental news 2026