EU DECODED: How and why is EU downgrading protection status of wolves? - video Dailymotion

euronews (in English)

In this episode we ask why the EU is determined to reduce the protected status of wolves, a species almost extinct in this part of the world about a century ago.

Transcript

00:00About a century ago, the wolves were almost extinct in Europe.

00:20Their population recovered in the last 40 years when they were given protected status.

00:24But the European Union is now set to downgrade that status in a move that pits environmentalists

00:31against the agriculture sector.

00:33Udi Coder tells the story this week.

00:36Wolves are now present in almost all EU countries, with numbers having increased from 11,000

00:42in 2012 to over 20,000 last year.

00:46Italy, Bulgaria, Romania and Spain all have populations of over 2,000.

00:53Economists in a few countries called for a review of the wolf conservation status

00:57and in late 2022, the European Parliament called for their strictly protected status

01:02to be downgraded.

01:04The European Commission subsequently proposed such a change, a move that has now been endorsed

01:09by European governments, paving the way for a change to EU law.

01:14Ahead of its proposal, the Commission gathered data and surveyed public opinion.

01:1970% of the respondents said they were against reducing the protected status of wolves.

01:25We asked people in Madrid for their opinion.

01:49Robert Hodgson covered this very heated debate for Euronews.

02:20The EU gathers data on the wolves every six years and more is expected in 2026.

02:27Why didn't the Commission wait until then before acting?

02:31In 2022, the wolf became a sort of hot political potato.

02:36First of all, we had farmers and hunting lobbies complaining that they needed the right to

02:43shoot wolves because the population was becoming too big and animals were being attacked more

02:47frequently.

02:48At the same time, the European People's Party, the centre-right group in the European Parliament,

02:54got on board and started backing calls for an easing of protection.

03:00And towards the end of the year, they managed to push through a resolution in the European

03:04Parliament calling for the protection status to be downgraded from strictly protected to

03:09protected.

03:10But it was also the very famous episode with the Ursula von der Leyen's pony.

03:16How did that contribute?

03:17Ursula von der Leyen is a famous lover of horses and her family estate in northern Germany

03:23suffered a wolf attack and a 30-year-old pony was killed in that attack.

03:28It got a lot of media coverage, obviously, especially in Germany.

03:32The farmers' associations welcomed the proposal, they are quite happy with it, but environmentalists

03:39and scientists say that there could be very serious repercussions.

03:43Why is that?

03:44Well, now they can be hunted or they will be once the change has gone through.

03:51And that, of course, is what farming and hunting lobbies wanted, they say it's necessary.

03:58Environmental groups, on the other hand, are concerned now that there may be over-hunting

04:01and the growth in population we've seen since the Berne Convention came into effect might

04:06now be reversed and we'll start losing wolf populations across Europe.

04:10And can this decision still be reversed?

04:15Well, it can be reversed because under the rules of the Berne Convention now they have

04:19until, they have three months to object to the outcome of the vote and that could reverse

04:26the vote.

04:27But that seems unlikely because only six countries actually voted against this change, six out

04:32of fifty.

04:34According to EU data, wolves kill about 65,500 head of livestock annually.

04:40The majority, some 73 per cent, are sheep and goats.

04:45These represent deaths of just 0.065 per cent of that livestock.

04:57For WWF this was really a politically motivated decision because actually in 2022, two years

05:08ago, also Switzerland made a proposal to the Berne Convention Standing Committee to lower

05:14the protection status of wolves and at that time the EU was clearly saying that this was

05:23not grounded on any scientific evidence or conservation reasons.

05:27No, I think actually it's based on scientific data, on the fact that the population of wolves

05:36in Europe, in the European Union and overall in Europe recovered.

05:40Once the directive was introduced in 1992, the wolf was practically extinguished in Europe,

05:47in the European Union and today we have more than 25,000 animals.

05:58If you want to protect your livestock from wolf depredation, which is the main argument

06:05used by the Commission to commit the proposal, the only effective way to avoid this is to

06:12invest in protection measures like electric fencing, shepherding, lifeguarding dogs, etc.

06:21Flexible management means that the Member State has the possibility to look how many

06:26animals are there and how many animals you want to have, clearly not endangering the

06:33species as such.

06:34This clearly means that some of the wolves you need to kill, some of these wolves you

06:38need to be very open on this.

06:46The EU was very much a driving force behind the adoption of the Global Biodiversity Framework

06:54in Montreal and this is giving a very bad signal because we ask other regions in the

07:03world to live together with elephants, with tigers, with lions, but we are not ourselves

07:10ready to live together with wolves.

07:13No, I think not at all.

07:14As I said, I see this from my place at home, I'm coming from the middle of the mountains

07:18of the Alps, I would rather say that the wolf is becoming more and more attractive for biodiversity

07:25because we are losing classical mountain pastures which are biodiversity, also them,

07:33so I think we need a balance.

07:36There has been no reports of wolves attacking humans in Europe for the last 50 years.

07:42However, peaceful coexistence remains a challenge outside conservation reserves such as this

07:48one in Limburg in Belgium.

07:50Whether the measure will help to create more harmony between man and beast remains to be seen.

EU DECODED: How and why is EU downgrading protection status of wolves?

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