Por Redaccion 
PP, Vox, Junts and PNV can finalize the protection of the wolf north of the Duero this Thursday in the Congress of Deputies. The Lower House will vote that day on whether to incorporate or reject the more than 40 amendments included by the Senate to the Law on the prevention of food loss and waste. One of them, proposed by the PP in the Upper House and supported by Vox, Junts and PNV, involves lowering the protection of the wolf.
The rule will be approved if the same parties vote in favor in Congress. The votes in favor of the PP (with 137 deputies), Vox (with 33), Junts (with seven) and EAJ-PNV (with five) would already add up to an absolute majority (a total of 182), necessary to approve the incorporation of amendments introduced by the Senate and accepted by Congress.
Through the amendment, a final provision is added that modifies the Royal Decree for the development of the List of Wild Species under Special Protection Regime (LESPRE) and specifies that the protected population is the one south of the Duero. The ‘popular’ party justifies this measure to «control the impact that the species is having on livestock farms and thus food waste.»
«Spanish legislation establishes that the corpses of animals, including those killed by wolf attacks, must be managed in accordance with health regulations to prevent disease risks. Consequently, only the waste from the corpses of livestock generated in a year by attacks of wild fauna, constitute an impact on the food generation of livestock farms of four million kilos of meat, given that more than 14,000 animals were killed including calves, cows, foals, and sheep,» explains the PP in the justification of the amendment, as reported by Europa Press.
In principle, if the Lower House endorses this change, it would enter into force once the rule is published in the Official State Gazette (BOE), something that usually happens a few days after approval, although there have also been occasions when texts have been delayed.
AAGESEN REQUESTED TO WAIT FOR THE CENSUS
In a recent breakfast with Europa Press, the Minister for Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge, Sara Aagesen, indicated that she expects to have the new census of Spanish wolf populations before summer, when it has to be sent to the European Commission. Asked about the possible exclusion of the species from the LESPRE, as demanded by the PP on several occasions, the minister referred to the data that may be known in the census, so she said that it was necessary to wait. «Our way of acting in this case with the wolf and I believe practically with everything is based on science,» she insisted.
The Government has expressed itself similarly in responding to a written question in Congress registered by Vox, in which those of Santiago Abascal have inquired whether the Government has among its priorities to address the threat that the wolf poses to both livestock breeders and those living in rural areas of Spain, and whether the Government intends to act to prevent the wolf population from continuing to grow «and even colonize areas where it had not previously been present.»
In this way, the Government explains that it considers as a «priority» the need to minimize the conflict that exists between the wolf and extensive livestock farming. In this sense, it recalled that it acquired the commitment to support the autonomous communities, «the competent administrations,» to facilitate the adoption of preventive or protective measures for livestock and the payment of compensation for wolf damage. For this, it transferred a fund of 20 million euros in 2022 and 2024.
«Logically, the increase in wolf populations must be accompanied by the measures mentioned in the previous question for the protection of livestock and compensation for damages, which must decrease as the application of preventive measures becomes more widespread,» it states.
On the other hand, the Ministry for Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge (MITECO) indicates that it is continuing the development of projects aimed at acquiring and increasing knowledge about this species, such as the National Census and the National Program for marking and monitoring of specimens, as well as others aimed at optimizing existing preventive measures and designing new ones.
Likewise, the Government indicates that the presence of the wolf in Spain has been considered widespread in the past, but that the expansion of human activities and direct persecution have significantly reduced it, especially throughout the 20th century. Its subsequent protection led to a slight expansion from the 1980s onwards. In 2018, it was estimated that between 55-59% of the Iberian territory could be potential habitat for the species, although the wolf is only present in approximately 20% of it.
In any case, the Government emphasizes that wolves do not pose a risk to human safety according to the existing scientific knowledge, which shows that the species sees humans as not prey. In this sense, it indicates that known attacks in the past have always been linked to rabies, a disease that dogs used to transmit to wolves in the past, which are not reservoirs of it. «Once rabies is no longer present, the few wolf attacks on humans have completely disappeared,» it states.
Furthermore, it points out that the conservation status of the species in Spain is unfavorable, in accordance with the requirements of the community and state regulatory framework, and that it is necessary to correct this situation to comply with European regulations in this regard.
Finally, it emphasizes that, according to the Government’s considerations in this regard, the recolonization by the wolf of the territory is a process largely associated with the increasing expansion of its prey (wild ungulates). «This should allow us to restore a favorable conservation status for the species, which will facilitate compliance with environmental regulations,» it adds.
Therefore, it states that the presence of this predator brings different benefits related to the control of the overabundance of ungulates. «These cause significant damage to agriculture and forests, pose a potential health risk to livestock, and cause a high and increasing number of accidents on roads,» it concludes.