“Give respite to surviving animals”: a call to demonstrate against hunting on October 24 after the summer fires

Around forty environmental defense associations are calling for a mobilization against hunting on October 24 in Paris, asking the State to do more “for the protection of severely affected wildlife” after the heatwaves and fires of the summer.

This appeal, signed in particular by Aspas, an association for the protection of wild animals, and One Voice, an association for the defense of animal rights, follows the petition "No guns on the ashes" launched in July to demand "the suspension of hunting in the forest areas ravaged by this summer's fires", in order to "grant the necessary respite to surviving animals".

The petition brings together more than 530,000 signatures, making it the most signed on Change.org in France this year, according to the platform. The march on October 24, which will start at 1:30 p.m. from Place Saint-Sulpice, in the center of Paris, aims to demand "a response from the State for the protection of the sentient (all sentient living beings, Editor's note) and an exemplary commitment to the protection of wild fauna which is severely affected and disoriented."

The author of the petition, Bruno Valentin, who assures that he is "not being politicized", deplores to AFP the lack of action by the public authorities. “We must strongly affirm our solidarity with the martyred wildlife, the local residents who are also direct victims of this summer's cataclysms and all French citizens in a context of growing eco-anxiety,” indicates the press release for the mobilization. The general opening of hunting in France takes place around mid-September.

During the summer, “at least twenty” departmental prefects had issued orders to suspend or limit hunting after the drought and exceptional fires, some “now lifted,” Mathieu Lefèvre, Minister Delegate for Ecological Transition, declared in early September. He notably asked the prefects to locally suspend waterfowl hunting, which starts at the end of August, in the event of a “calamity”.

The minister, on the other hand, estimated that “national measures were not adapted to the differences in territorial realities”. No department has announced any change to the dates, according to hunters and environmental associations. In Gironde, where more than 40,000 hectares of forest have burned, burned areas remain closed and therefore “inaccessible” for hunting in fifteen municipalities, according to the prefecture. For Bruno Valentin and the associations that will be mobilized, “it is up to the government to summon the prefectures (to) take their responsibilities”.