“Alarming data is arriving on the wild boar issue and the overpopulation of these ungulates. Vineyards, olive groves, corn and cereal fields, sunflower or vegetable crops: the list of raids carried out by uncontrolled wildlife in the countryside is long, with wild boars in first place, which have reached 2.3 million specimens on the national territory . An emergency that causes enormous damage to agriculture – a sector recognized as excellent for Made in Italy – which suffers continuous devastation, but also for the more striking issue of safety of citizens in urban centres”.
Thus the national President of Acli Terra, Nicola Tavoletta. Two hundred million euros of damage in the last year alone to Italian agriculture, which represents a national pride, but is not sufficiently protected: Puglia, with over 30 million euros and 250 thousand wild boars, and Tuscany, with over 20 million of euros, of which 80% due to the 200 thousand wild boars, are the regions that have paid the most for the presence of these ungulates.
In Lazio, the estimated damage from wild boars alone exceeds 10 million euros and in some cases even concerns 80% of the harvest. The damage estimated in Calabria is over 10 million euros, according to data released by Coldiretti colleagues.
A further dramatic element is that the only phenomenon that affects the limitation of exponential growth is African swine fever, which is extremely dangerous for our pig farms, which employ around 100,000 workers.
Furthermore, no regional territory is immune from the problem and, unfortunately, the Regions themselves are in difficulty with the payment of compensation, which arrives after years and with values lower than the actual damages.
“Faced with this emergency situation – underlines the President of the professional agricultural association Tavoletta -, we therefore join the appeals of Coldiretti and Confagricoltura in hoping for extraordinary containment plans, asking the Government, and specifically the Ministries of Agriculture and the Environment, a national strategy to have an effective impact. Today many farmers are using their own resources to build defensive barriers and this once again affects the costs of agricultural production”.
Source: Acli Terra
