Austrian farm minister pushes for quick adoption of proposal to lower wolf’s protection status

4 months ago 23

Austrian diplomats will present a note pushing for quick adoption of the proposal to lower the protection status of wolves at a Council meeting on Monday (27 May) but EU countries are split on the issue, with a group of capitals calling for more data on the level of threat posed by the species.

Wolves are a strictly protected species in Europe, meaning they can only be killed under exceptional circumstances.

Last December the European Commission proposed to lower the level of their protection, mainly to preserve livestock and shelter farmers from the economic impact of wolves’ attacks.

A note to be presented by the Austrian delegation at the Agriculture and Fisheries (AGRIFISH) Council on Monday seeks to “rapidly finalise discussions” on the proposal “to provide the necessary flexibility” for member states to manage wolves’ population, considering “the rise in the number of wolf attacks on livestock across Europe”.

The aim is to downgrade wolves from “strictly protected” to “protected species” under the Bern convention on wildlife conservation in Europe, a prerequisite for a change in the EU’s own legislation, the Habitats Directive.

The Austrian note acknowledges the role of the directive in protecting endangered fauna in Europe but says that “circumstances have fundamentally changed” in the last thirty years.

“The recovering of certain protected carnivores, such as the wolf, has led to severe problems in the field of agriculture and forestry,” the Austrian document said, calling for action to tackle the rising population of other large carnivores, such as the brown bear.

However, making a decision on the Commission’s proposal is not down to agricutlure ministers but to their environment counterparts, who will meet on 17 June.

According to an EU diplomat, work will continue at a technical level in the Environment Council, as the discussions are not yet “mature” enough and will likely be passed on to the Hungarian presidency of the EU Council, who will take over from Belgium on 1 July.

The source cited disagreement over the scientific background to the proposal and said that more figures were needed to find a common position before the Bern convention meets at the end of the year.

Austria’s Environment Minister Leonore Gewessler – unlike her agriculture counterpart Norbert Totschnig – has in the past spoken out in favour of maintaining the wolf’s high protection status, as have other EU environment ministers.

In February last year, environment ministers from 12 member states, spearheaded by Slovakia, wrote to the European Commission to uphold the wolf’s protection status.

In September, the European Parliament was split in a debate on the topic.

Mixed opinions

A diplomatic source told Euractiv that the delegations of some EU countries – including Spain, Portugal, Ireland, Belgium, Luxembourg, and Germany – are asking for more data on the situation of the species before continuing the work in the Council.

Others – such as Austria, Romania, Sweden, Slovakia, Finland, Italy, the Czech Republic, and Lithuania – are keen to proceed with a vote on the Commission proposal, said the source.

The change in the protection status would open the door to wolf hunting in the bloc, a move described by environmental NGOs as politically motivated and lacking any scientific basis.

Ten NGOs raised the alarm over the Commission’s proposal in an open letter sent to EU ambassadors on 8 May, pointing out that the EU has rejected similar proposals in the past due to concerns over the scientific basis for changing the wolf’s protected status.