December 2021 

BIWFC Europe: The First 100 Days

In December 2021 the BIWFC Europe will be 100 days old, so…good time for an update!

I recently submitted a blog entitled “Too many? Finding solutions for human-wildlife conflicts” and a colleague asked me to be more specific: was I referring to too many animals? Or people? Or human-wildlife conflicts? I did not change the title because this was exactly the point: “too many” refers to all the above and was one of the reasons that the BIWFC Europe was born.

Since its beginnings, the leitmotif of many activities of the BIWFC Europe has been Building Bridges, echoing the Creating Connections theme of the 9th International Conference on Wildlife Fertility Control.

I started my new job by setting many “European wheels” in motion. This meant reaching out to teams engaged in research and practical applications of wildlife fertility control, talking to various organisations about what BIWFC can offer, and liaising with groups that might consider fertility control to manage human-wildlife conflicts.

I asked all “my wheels,” to send me a 2–3-minute video and a synopsis of the issue, in terms of context, species, reasons why this has become an issue, methods used to tackle the problem so far, and rationale for evaluating the use of fertility control. This news will be shared on BIWFC Europe section of our website.

The response has been fantastic, and I am expecting the first contributions this month. As a result, I am now mapping projects and initiatives happening in Europe. The idea is to continue to populate the map of Europe with dots and links to individual projects, towards a three-way win-win:

  1.  fulfilling the BIWFC’s mandate of informing and connecting stakeholders
  2.  avoiding duplication of efforts
  3.  providing a platform for organisations and groups to raise awareness about their work.

It would be wonderful if, in the near future, whoever wants to work on wildlife X in context Y could use the map to learn more about a specific topic and build on previous results.

Plenty of ideas to explore, short-term goals and long-term plans that I will share in the next letter and that will keep me very busy in the coming months.

For the time being, warm thanks to all the colleagues and friends that are enthusiastically helping to build what we hope will become a go-to resource for this overcrowded continent.

With best wishes for Christmas and for the new year, stay safe

Giovanna

Dr. Giovanna Massei
Europe Director