The Coldiretti investigation
Almost seven out of ten Italians (69%) believe that wild boars are too numerous while there is even 58% who consider them a real threat to the population, as well as a serious problem for crops and for the environmental balance as 75% of the interviewees think. This is what emerges from the Coldiretti/Ixe' investigation in reference to the alarm on the invasion of this wild species raised by the Extraordinary Commissioner for African swine fever, Vincenzo Caputo, in a hearing in the Agriculture Commission of the Chamber.
Lots of problems to solve
The herds - Coldiretti underlines - are moving ever closer to homes and schools, up to parks, destroying crops, attacking animals, besieging stables, causing road accidents with deaths and injuries and scratching through waste with obvious health risks. The result - underlines Coldiretti - is that over six Italians out of 10 (62%) are really afraid of it and almost half (48%) would not even take a house in an area infested with wild boars.
Incalculable economic damage
The situation has become unsustainable with Italy invaded by 2,3 million wild boars in the cities and countryside with incalculable economic damage to agricultural production but - continues Coldiretti - the environmental balance of vast territorial ecosystems in areas of naturalistic value is also compromised with the loss of both animal and vegetable biodiversity without forgetting the risks for farms and Made in Italy at the table with the spread of the African plague. "The excessive presence of wild animals is a real national emergency that affects people's safety as well as the economy and work, especially in the most disadvantaged areas" denounces the president of Coldiretti Ettore Prandini in underlining the need "to targeted and large-scale interventions to reduce the threat of wild boars at a national level” (source: Coldiretti).