ÌìÃÀÊÓƵ

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration on Monday proposed  from the endangered species list after 45 years of conservation.

NOAA’s proposal would consider of the whales “” for the endangered species list. The Cape Verde Islands/Northwest Africa and Arabian Sea populations would still be considered endangered, and the Western North Pacific and the Central America populations would remain in the category of threatened.

NOAA in 1970, and credits the resurgence in humpback populations to successful conservation efforts around the world.

“It’s quite a big deal, to bring a species to a point where the population is doing well and no longer needs” to be classified as endangered, Donna Wieting, director of NOAA Fisheries office of protected resources, said during a press conference. “These kinds of recovery efforts happen from the efforts of people, agencies [and] citizen actions, in addition to all the scientific research.”

Eileen Sobeck, assistant NOAA administrator for fisheries, said the humpback’s return is an Endangered Species Act “success story.”

This would be the first time NOAA has removed a whale from the endangered species list since the agency .

Delisting a species helps NOAA show the effectiveness of protection and conservation. It also can loosen requirements for commercial activity.

For example, because federal approval is required before initiating any activity that might harm an endangered animal, to delist humpbacks, which would make it easier to authorize oil company drilling.

NOAA estimates that the West Indies population of humpback whales is , while the East Australia population is growing 11 percent a year, on average.

The population of Northern Pacific humpbacks, which feed in Alaskan waters and migrate to Hawaii every year to breed, is estimated to be .

Rebecca Noblin, Alaska director for the Center of Biological Diversity that delisting humpbacks may be premature.

“It would really be beneficial to continue to have the protections of the Endangered Species Act as the oceans change,” Noblin said, pointing out that the whales continue to face threats from factors such as climate change and ocean acidification.

NOAA Fisheries opened the delisting proposal for a . The process of removing the whales from the endangered species list will take about a year.

If the proposal takes effect, the delisted humpback populations in U.S. waters under the Marine Mammal Protection Act, and internationally under the International Whaling Commission’s global moratorium on commercial whaling. Those four humpback populations still considered endangered or threatened would remain protected under the U.S. Endangered Species Act.