Raise awareness against illegal hunting phenomena (better known as poaching) and draw attention to the protection of protected species: this is the goal of the new collaboration born between UNA Foundation - Man, Nature, Environment - And Federparchi, which will take off from the Gran Paradiso Park and then move on to other prestigious Italian parks. Territories along the boot where species that are subject to particular attention live because, over time, they are threatened by episodes of poaching. The Gran Paradiso Park is the protagonist of this first focus and with it its iconic animals: the Alpine Ibex, a species symbolizing the effectiveness of the conservation activities activated in the park and destined for a long time to disappear from this territory, but which now populates the prairies along the whole alpine arc; Bearded Vultures and Royal Eagles, also historical victims of poaching which in the past led to their almost complete disappearance from the Alpine territories of the Aosta Valley; the Eurasian otter, on which the Water and Biodiversity Center of Rovenaud is doing a dedicated work, which hosts some specimens in captivity working for a future reintroduction in Nature.
Today, thanks to the activities to protect the fauna and the territory, these species have returned to proliferate and safely frequent the skies and woods of the valleys of Aosta. “In collaboration with the UNA Foundation, we are carrying out visits to the national parks to discover the good practices put in place for the conservation and management of fauna. In the Gran Paradiso National Park a great deal of work has always been done in terms of scientific research and monitoring, also thanks to the help of the park rangers, trained professionals who are also able to intervene in terms of control of any illegal activities”Declared Giampiero Sammuri, President of Federparchi.
Renata Briano, President of the Scientific Committee of the UNA Foundation, echoed him: “The threats to biodiversity today are many, and range from pollution to overbuilding to chemicals in agriculture. There is no hunting but there is poaching: reason why we want to launch a strong message to fight this phenomenon, with the aim of preserving our ecosystems ". The idea of to position hunting as a sustainable and responsible activity, far from poaching and in favor of the protection of protected species, is one of the founding values of the UNA Foundation, which believes in the figure of the hunter as the "Paladin of the Territory", guardian of the ecosystem's faunal and natural balance.
The hunting activity is to be understood, in fact, as a useful and positive element of environmental sustainability, to guarantee the maintenance of natural balances. It is no coincidence that the UNA Foundation, already in 2020, became part of IUCN, International Union for the Conservation of Nature, thus bringing the hunting world to one of the main places of international dialogue on biodiversity issues. Parallel to a dissemination campaign on the importance of protecting protected species, UNA Foundation will use its resources to educate the hunting community itself on the importance of adopting a sustainable hunting model, fully respectful of the rules, and in contrast to any form of poaching.