During the monitoring visit of LIFE Bear-Smart Corridors – a formal moment to verify that what has been done so far by the partners is consistent with the plans and rules of the European Commission – the role of bear-smart communities for human-bear coexistence in the central Apennines was strongly emphasized through testimonies, field visits, and official moments.
The LIFE Bear-Smart Corridors initiative has reached the halfway point and it is time for partners to take stock, as well as for the communities benefiting from the initiative aimed at improving bear conservation in the central Apennines and northern Greece through best practices of human-bear coexistence implemented by numerous communities sharing their territory with the bears.
At the end of May, the Abruzzo, Lazio and Molise National Park hosted the second monitoring visit for the LIFE Bear-Smart Corridors initiative. This is a meeting aimed at checking the technical and financial progress of the project where a third party, appointed by the European Commission, conducts the necessary checks along with the project partners. Therefore, it is a very important moment for any project funded by the European LIFE program.
After the first monitoring visit held in April 2023 at the Monte Genzana Regional Nature Reserve, the second meeting took place in the Abruzzo, Lazio and Molise National Park, in Villetta Barrea, a municipality within the Park that has embarked on the path to becoming a Bear-Smart Community.
Usually, the first part of the monitoring visit consists of a day of technical, administrative, and financial control of the project actions that have been carried out so far. The second part, which is more dynamic and immersive, takes place with field visits to the locations where the project actions have been implemented, analyzing, also in light of the discussions from the previous day, the critical issues, strengths, and future trajectories of the ongoing project.
Since the Life Bear-Smart Corridors initiative has a strong social dimension, a particular focus of the monitoring visit was the meeting with local communities and, especially, with key stakeholders for human-bear coexistence. In the presence of the Technical Monitor, Dr. Evi Papantoniou, and the Project Advisor, Dr. Anita Fassio, the project partners met and spoke with some representatives of the “I Folletti di Monte Mattone” Social Promotion Association in Villetta Barrea, which was founded for the promotion of community agriculture and beekeeping, as a local response to early fruit harvesting experiences organized by the National Park staff to prevent bears from entering the town.
They visited several municipal buildings that will become community labs and a community apiary, where, with the electric fences provided by the Life Bear-Smart Corridors project, the beehives of three different beekeepers have been secured. They then visited the location where bear-proof garbage containers have been installed, also in Villetta Barrea, and witnessed the live delivery of a bear-proof chicken coop to a young local family.
Finally, to conclude the morning, at the Park Services Center of Villetta Barrea, the Project Monitors met some Mayors of the Park’s Municipalities involved in the project, who then proceeded to sign Memoranda of Understanding between the Park and the Municipal Administrations, with the aim of formalizing the necessary actions for the establishment of Bear-Smart Communities. This formal and necessary act aims to continue and strengthen the cooperation between Entities, Institutions, and NGOs within the Life BSC.
In the afternoon, the field visit continued in the Roveto Valley, a very important ecological corridor for the expansion of the Marsican bear population. Here, Rewilding Apennines and Salviamo l’Orso brought the monitors and other project partners to meet with the operators of the Zompo lo Schioppo Nature Reserve to verify the human-bear coexistence actions being implemented in the municipalities of Morino and Civita d’Antino, within the emerging Bear-Smart Community of the Roveto Valley-Ernici. In particular, they visited the info point at the Reserve headquarters, where a public meeting on human-bear coexistence was recently held for the stakeholders of the Roveto Valley, the tourist welcome area set up with the Bear-Smart Community information panel, and where bear-proof bins are soon to be installed.
The initiatives carried out thanks to the LIFE Bear-Smart Corridors are gradually bearing fruit, and the remaining work aims to provide local communities with all the tools and best practices to long-term benefit from human-bear coexistence from an ecological, cultural, and economic perspective.