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The first scientific expedition to Svalbard was the Russian Čičagov Expedition between 1764 and 1766, which passed Svalbard in an unsuccessful attempt to find the Northern Sea Route. It made among water and topography measurements. [29] The second expedition was organized by the Royal Navy and led by Constantine Phipps in 1773.
Agriculture in Svalbard – the archipelago containing the world's northernmost permanently inhabited settlements – has a short history, and remains a minor economic factor, but has nonetheless had a culturally and socially significant role, as well as an ecologic impact.
The foundation for conservation was established in the Svalbard Treaty of 1920, and has further been specified in the Svalbard Environmental Act of 2001. [16] The first round of protection took force on 1 July 1973, when most of the current protected areas came into effect. This included the two large nature reserves and five of the national parks.
Longyearbyen (Urban East Norwegian: [ˈlɔ̀ŋjɛrˌbyːən], [3] locally [ˈlɔ̀ŋjɑrˌbyːən], "Longyear Town") is the world's northernmost settlement with a population greater than 1,000, and the largest inhabited area of Svalbard, Norway.
Svalbard was undoubtedly spotted by Willem Barentsz of the Netherlands in 1596, [4] although it may have previously have been discovered by Norsemen or Pomors. [5] The Muscovy Company of England started walrus hunting on Bjørnøya in 1604, [6] and from 1611 the company's Jonas Poole started whaling around Spitsbergen. The following year the ...
A third period began in 1978, and has lasted until the present day. Preceded by an article written by the Norwegian-Russian palaeontologist Anatol Heintz in 1964, a Soviet expedition from the Institute of Archaeology at the USSR Academy of Sciences – led by Vadim F. Starkov – set out to prove that the Russian Pomors had preceded the Dutch on Svalbard.
Soviet agriculture on Svalbard has had a significant impact on the archipelago's ecosystem, through both intentional and accidental introduction of alien species. An example of the former can be found in Pyramiden, where Svalbard reindeer can be seen grazing on the central square's overgrown lawns, in which Ukrainian grass grows on dark ...
Once named Spitsbergen after its largest island, the Svalbard archipelago was made a part of Norway—not a dependency—by the Svalbard Act of 1925. Since this date, it has been a region of Norway, with a Norwegian-appointed governor resident at the administrative centre of Longyearbyen.