The data emerging from the latest monitoring
80% of ungulate damage to agricultural crops is caused by wild boars. To affirm it is Coldiretti Molise highlighting that, from 2012 to 2022 (data still partial for the last year) the devastation caused by these wild animals exceeded 5 million euros. The numbers emerged on the basis of data from the Molise Region according to which in 2021 alone 500 thousand euros of damages attributable to wild boars alone were reported, a figure up by 25% compared to the previous year, which has stabilized in recent years at 4-500 thousand euros per year. 'year.
The wild boars present in Molise
Coldiretti Molise estimates that there are over 40 wild boars in the region, i.e. one for every 7 inhabitants, compared to the two animals per hectare envisaged for the sustainable maintenance of the ecosystem. With these numbers, wild boars have become increasingly a threat to road traffic and therefore to the safety and public health of citizens. In fact, there have been 866 road accidents caused by these animals in the last four years alone, showing an increase in percentage terms of around 80% each year. As regards, however, the economic damage caused, from 2012 to 2022, this is quantifiable in 1 million and 500 thousand euros.
The most marginal areas
"The presence of ungulates and predators is one of the main causes of the abandonment of our countryside, our mountains and above all the most marginal areas even if the emergency has now reached even the cities - explains Claudio Papa, new President of Coldiretti Molise - Hundreds and hundreds of fertile hectares in our region have been abandoned, contributing to the increased risk of erosion and hydrogeological instability. Farming has become impossible and unsustainable with direct consequences on landscape maintenance, land care, biodiversity and food production for the community. The out-of-control presence of the population of this species - Pope continues - forces farmers to guard the vineyards, the corn fields, the crops. Reporting damages, which never fully repay the work and investments, cannot continue to be the solution to the problem just as we cannot raise fences everywhere. These animals - the President of Coldiretti specifies - dig holes in search of food, knock down walls, make tourists flee and reset the profitability of farms. It's an unequal fight. The balance has been broken, not only in the countryside, and must be restored”.
The utility of selecontrol
For years Coldiretti Molise has been fighting to reduce the wild boar population. In Molise, at the request of the regional Federation, selecontrol was introduced by the Region, a regulation that allows farmers-hunters to intervene directly against ungulates to protect crops, after having signaled their presence in their own funds. Now the national government is also moving. "It is a first measure - concludes the regional president, Claudio Papa - What we are asking for is a very urgent decree law, at a national level, to amend article 19 of Law 157 of 1992 which allows for the extension of the control plans coordinated by the Regions and thus arrive at a drastic way to normalize a phenomenon that no longer concerns only farmers but the whole community” (source: Coldiretti).
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