The Iberian wolf will soon be hunted if Spain's opposition party gets its way. Photo: Alamy
Spain's wolf population has emerged as an unlikely political issue in the upcoming Spanish general election after the main opposition conservative party promised to lift a total ban on killing animals.
The People's Party (PP), leading the polls ahead of the July 23rd elections, pledged this week in a manifesto to reverse the Spanish leftist government's 2021 decision to list the wolf as a protected species not to be hunted or killed.
The move would mean that a certain number of wolves in northwest Spain would be hunted or killed by forest rangers each year, and the proposal rekindled the debate over how to protect the largest animal population in Western Europe.
The hunting community has welcomed the possible abandonment of the «Disney» take on the wolf, but conservationists say it could jeopardize the small gains made by the Spanish lupine population, which was on the verge of extinction in the 1970s.
NP leader Alberto Nunez Feijoo (below) accused Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez of literally leaving farmers to be eaten by wolves and not allowing them to «control wolf populations».
The leader of the Spanish People's Party and candidate for prime minister, Alberto Nuñez Feijoo, takes part in the opening ceremony of the general election campaign in Barcelona. Photo: Shutterstock
Vox, a far-right party that hopes to fight its way into a coalition government with the NP at the national level, has already committed to abolish the protected status of wolves.
“The number of attacks by wolves on livestock in Castile and León has increased by 20 percent since the introduction of protection status. We have seen 5,000 animals killed in a year,” said José Angel Arranz, director general of rural affairs for the region, which is at the forefront of the fight against wolves in Spain, with more than half of the estimated 347 packs living here. .
Mr Arrantz told The Telegraph that the full protection of the wolf was the result of an «ideology» of «people who just don't understand how the rural environment works through ecosystems that have been shaped by human presence and need to be maintained» . /p>
Selectively hunted wolf populations are healthier, Mr. Arrantz said.
But Ignacio Martínez, president of the Iberian wolf conservation NGO Ascel, scorns the figures of alleged wolf damage to livestock, saying that any dead animal in the countryside is attributed to the wolf, so farmers can demand compensation «above market rates.»< /p>
“The wolf is a top predator and plays a key role in regulating a healthy ecosystem. There will never be an overpopulation of wolves: this is impossible because they live within their own borders,” said Mr Martinez. western corner of the country, possibly intermingling with individuals from other European countries in the Pyrenees.
“The subspecies of the Iberian wolf is weak due to decades of low numbers; it is a leak of genes, not a gene pool,” explained Mr. Martinez.
Last year, the European Parliament supported a proposal to lower the protection status of wolves as attacks on livestock have increased in a number of countries.
predator? Iberian wolves are controversial. Photo: Europa Press
«Wolves, people and farming methods simply don't go together in many areas,» said Manuel Gallardo, president of the Spanish Royal Hunting Federation (RFEC).
«We don't want wolves are extinct and there is little demand for this sport among hunters, but you have to control them and plan what areas they should and can live in.
“ There are two different wolves: a fictional Disney one in Madrid, which is a beautiful wild animal, and then you drive north and see this terrible predator that hunts the easiest option,” Mr. Gallardo said, adding that hunters and related services and professions made up “a community of four million voters who Spanish politicians would not ignore it.”
Свежие комментарии