With a letter addressed to Minister Clini, Legambiente asks for a solution to the Gray Squirrel question.
Legambiente writes to the Minister of the Environment, Corrado Clini, asking him to intervene on the issue of the Gray Squirrel: “immediately national stop to the trade in alien species”. ?? In Liguria, the most important European attempt is being made to reconcile the active protection of biodiversity with increased attention to animal welfare.
"We asked Minister Clini to assign a preferential and urgent way to approve the specific Ministerial Decree, on which state officials have been working for several years, in order to shut off the" tap "of the trade in alien squirrel species in our country ”Declared Vittorio Cogliati Dezza, national president of Legambiente.
In fact, these animals often suffer, after some time from purchase, the sad fate of abandonment in a nature that is not theirs, thus becoming one of the involuntary protagonists of the loss of biodiversity in Italy: why then continue to keep the trade open of allochthonous wild animals that are the cause of the erosion of biodiversity to defend which we are then forced to spend many resources to eliminate those same animals?
The heavy consequences, for biodiversity and damage to many economic activities, caused by the trade and spread of alien animal and plant species have been known for some time and in recent weeks have returned to the attention of the Italian public following the Life project. Natura LIFE09 / NAT / IT / 095 “EC-SQUARE” currently underway, promoted by the Regions of Lombardy, Piedmont and Liguria, for the protection of the red squirrel (Sciurus vulgaris), the autochthonous species of squirrel for Italy.
Italy has taken on numerous obligations deriving from International Conventions which impose, in various ways, to prevent the introduction of alien species and to keep under strict control and / or to eradicate those that threaten ecosystems, habitats and / or native species.
In this sense, at the European level, the regulation CE 338/97 for the application of CITES in Europe already operates, which prohibits the importation of four alien wild animal species: Red-cheeked turtle (Trachemys scripta elegans); Bullfrog (Rana catesbeiana); Painted pond turtle (Chrysemys picta); Hunchback of Jamaica (Oxyura jamaicensis). And recently the Scientific Review Group of EC Regulation 338/97 explicitly urged the blocking of the gray squirrel's import into the European Union.
In Italy, the current regulatory framework, with the Law of 11 February 1992 n.157 "Rules for the protection of homeothermic wildlife and for hunting" which treats all mammals and wild birds present permanently and temporarily in our country and can be classified among the fundamental rules of economic and social reform, in relation to the introduction of wild fauna from abroad, provide that this can happen "as long as it belongs to native species", thus meaning the legislator to exclude that this can happen for alien species, which has recently been confirmed among the priority measures for implementing the current National Strategy for Biodiversity (2011 - 2020) approved by the State-Regions Conference on 7 October 2010.
“The trade of the gray squirrel and other alien squirrel species present in our country remains, to this day, the main vector of introduction and diffusion. Without intervening to stop the intentional movements, any other measure and / or action will be severely limited if not even potentially thwarted ”declared Antonino Morabito, national wildlife manager of Legambiente.
"It would be serious if the absence of the trade blockade weakened what is currently in the field in Liguria to fail: one of the most important European actions to respond to the urgency of curbing the loss of biodiversity while maintaining attention to the increased sensitivity of our society to animal welfare, thus directing efforts towards the capture, sterilization and transfer of squirrels instead of the legitimate eradication of allochthonous animals present in the Nervi Park ”concluded Elena Dini Director of Legambiente Liguria.
The Legambiente Press Office