A very important document
The Young Agricultural Entrepreneurs Association (AGIA) of CIA Trentino and colleagues from the Südtiroler Bauernjugend (SBJ) presented their summary document jointly developed on the topic of large carnivores. Numerous parliamentarians from Trentino and South Tyrol came to listen to the concerns of young people. The demands are clear: efficient and coordinated legal bases are urgently needed, enabling the killing of problematic and harmful animals. The exact number of wolves in the Alpine region must be correctly recorded and stored in a common database.
The situation of the wolf and beyond
"Transparency and coordination in reporting the number of wolves and other large carnivores should play an important role, because it may turn out that the population has now become too high and for example, at the Alpine population level, the wolf is no longer a species in danger of extinction ”, underlines Alessio Chistè, president of AGIA Trentino. If it turns out that the population was much higher than that sanctioned by the Fauna-Flora-Habitat Directive, the conservation status of the wolf would have to be modified. Young people are not only concerned about the present, they are particularly concerned about the future. “We are also worried about the future of our children”, explains SBJ President Raffael Peer, “when you hear a rustle in the woods, when we were little we thought it was a squirrel, but now wolf attacks come to mind. We also want our children to be able to play outdoors and in the woods, we do not want to deprive them of this, which is a characteristic training experience for our territory ".
Problems for the pasture
Every year in spring and autumn thousands of animals are taken to the mountain pastures. Transhumance, the traditional pastoral practice of transhumance, was inscribed on the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage List in 2019. "This unique culture, which gives us a sense of home, must not become extinct", underline Raffael Peer (SBJ) and Alessio Chistè (AGIA). The latest agricultural census showed that within the next ten years 13,4% of farms in Trentino and 1,1% of farms in South Tyrol will be forced to close. Many small businesses make a living from sheep and goats and are concerned about their animals. Leaving animals in the stable all year round is not a viable option, because animal welfare is an essential requirement for the whole of society. But with large carnivores, at the same time, cattle on the mountain pastures are no longer safe. This further difficulty removes motivation from young people who want to take over a farm or to continue to manage it, because if all the effort and commitment are frustrated in one night, the joy of this job turns into frustration.
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