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.
Since late May, the Italian partners of LIFE Bear-Smart Corridors have been implementing a new initiative to engage local communities, to support the development of Bear-Smart Communities in the Central Apennines.
In Pettorano sul Gizio, the Bear Smart Community Genzana will be able to boast of having a unique, original place that is able to connect natural and human history in a permanent exhibition that will surprise everyone!
A productive three days of meetings and visits took place over the past few days in the town of Kalabaka in Thessaly.
Rewilding Apennines joins the numerous associations that have organized a demonstration in memory of the Amarena the bear, to ask the authorities and law enforcement agencies for greater control of the territory and commitment to the protection of fauna and for citizens to actively participate in putting into practice a real coexistence. The initiative will be held on Sunday 10 September at 10:00 in Piazza Mazzarino in Pescina (AQ).
The aim of the LIFE Bear-Smart Corridors initiative is to enhance human-bear coexistence in Italy, Greece, and further afield. The initiative’s well-attended first two public meetings, in the towns of Pettorano sul Gizio and Vastogirardi in the Central Apennines rewilding landscape, proved very positive and educational events.
A high participation of people characterized the first public event of the LIFE Bear-Smart Corridors in the Bear Smart Community Genzana, the first to be established in Italy 8 years ago.
The initiatives of the LIFE Bear-Smart Corridors project are as necessary as they are desirable in the areas of new expansion of the Marsican brown bear, such as Alto Molise. And here it is essential to meet the communities.
Recently, a local news website relating to the Gran Sasso area published a letter from one of its readers without first verifying the veracity of the content and, then, selecting the correct information. Since this letter concerns the presence of specimens of the Marsican brown bear in the Gran Sasso and Monti della Laga National Park, many have questioned whether it could undermine the delicate process of peaceful coexistence between the local communities and the bear in the newly expanding territories of the species, which is also carrying out through the LIFE Bear-Smart Corridors initiative.
The LIFE Bear-Smart Corridors project gets underway to meet the communities and ask: “Is it possible to live in an area where bears also live? And how?”