The European Parliament acknowledges that attacks by large carnivores are on the rise across Europe and that they have had negative effects on livestock farmers, by adopting (306 votes in favour, 225 against and 25 abstentions) on Thursday 24 November a joint resolution by the EPP, S&D, Renew Europe, Greens/EFA and ECR groups.
An EPP amendment, adopted in plenary, calls on the European Commission to “regularly assess the progress made in achieving the conservation status for species at the level of biogeographical regions and/or EU-wide populations”. The European Parliament calls on the Commission to develop without delay an assessment procedure to “enable the protection status of populations in particular regions to be amended as soon as the desired conservation status has been reached”.
By adopting an amendment (from EPP and ECR), MEPs welcome the fact that the item ‘Proposal for amendment: Downlisting of the wolf from Appendix II to Appendix III of the Convention’ has been placed on the agenda of the 42nd meeting of the Standing Committee of the Bern Convention, and stress that “the conservation status of the wolf at pan-European level justifies a mitigation of the protection status and consequently the adoption of the proposed amendment”.
The Parliament rejected an ECR amendment calling on the Commission to “propose, without delay and in accordance with Article 19 of the Habitats Directive, the necessary amendment to adapt the annexes to scientific progress with regard to the conservation status of the wolf, by moving the wolf species from strict Annex IV protection to Annex V protection”.
For the Commission, “strict protection status is still necessary to achieve and maintain a favourable conservation status”. It recalled that the killing of individual wolves is already allowed under certain conditions.
The European Parliament calls on the Commission and EU countries to scientifically identify the best possible preventive measures to reduce attacks.
For more information: https://aeur.eu/f/49g (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)