The Prime Minister said the Administration wants to “go all the way on hunting” (www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20101030/local/we-ll-go-all-the-way-on-hunting-pm-says).
I have worked incessantly for the past 20 years to raise awareness on our natural heritage, to inform the authorities and work with them mostly in my free time and on my own initiative about the myriad of illegal developments all over the island. I have worked to develop nature and ecotourism for the islands and, yet, I feel all these efforts always go down the drain when such a statement is made in the country I live in and for which I have dedicated so much time and effort at many a personal cost.
The same counts for MEP John Attard Montalto who, on the same day, sent a mailshot to houses informing us that spring hunting is not negotiable. I am totally at a loss on how to continue promoting Malta’s natural heritage, tourism and countryside walks when hunting remains so rife and is even encouraged by the leader of the country.
As a tourist guide I have just finished a week of alternative nature tours, which I developed together with a foreign tour operator. It involved highlighting our islands’ natural assets while also supporting local initiatives of organic farming and nature conservation. Yet, each day, as in countless other occasions, I had to explain to the group why the birds were being blasted out of the sky each morning just a few metres away from them and why these birds were left to die an agonising death on the ground.
Have our political leaders never been out to check this situation for themselves especially during peak migration of birds? I had to keep telling the members of the group to be careful not to look up to the sky because of the lead shot showering us. In other public areas I had to advise them on safety not because of the cliff edges but because of trapping cords all over or even to avoid speaking to hunters as the situation could be dangerous.
How am I to continue promoting Malta when each time one of our greatest assets (Malta could be one of the best birdwatching and walking sites in the Mediterranean) is given the death sentence by our own politicians?
Just last season I had to pick up a dying injured bird while walking in our only national natural park and had to explain to the shocked French tourists with me this little dying bird could be shot in spring and even in a protected area. And it could simply be left there to die as nobody would want it for anything! Two weeks ago, children with me were shocked to see a beautiful kestrel dead just next to a bird sanctuary – left to rot there just for the fun of it.
Need I also mention the fact that each year I take out hundreds of local and foreign students for nature walks in our countryside with the aim of instilling a sense of respect, pride and appreciation for what remains of our countryside and wherever one is in the countryside there is not one safe place to walk in during the shooting frenzy of peak migration days?
Need I go into the year-in-year-out problem of shotgun cartridges and lead everywhere? I also have to end up cleaning after them and then we are told our tax money will again be going to continue a ridiculous battle for a small proportion of the population who wants to keep blasting birds out of the sky even in spring!
Please bear in mind that, apart from the simple fact that when speaking on rights, you must not, dear politicians, in this International Year of Biodiversity forget that even wildlife has a right to live, any such cruel sport should be on the way out and not encouraged further! You seem to forget the rights of the thousands of Maltese who are against hunting and the myriad of visitors who send in their views. Ecotourism should have been among the priorities of the government as promised in 2002 – the year for ecotourism.
The hunting season lasts from September 1 till the end of January, five full months!
And the Prime Minister wants our island to end up in court to allow another shooting spree even in nature’s most sacred time of spring.
Should I cancel all countryside walks and all outdoor environmental education due to Malta’s lack of commitment towards nature protection?
Being a Maltese I feel thoroughly ashamed of this situation where, despite the multi-crises we are faced with on resource depletion (soil, water and what not), the government still deems it fit to defend a bloodsport and fork out money, time and human resources for a destructive practice. So much for biodiversity protection. So much for the promotion of a green destination.
There is the rest of the population who has a right to enjoy a safe walk in the countryside and enjoy nature even for the purpose of healthy living reasons. And what about the right of people like me who work in the countryside? Is there to be greater rights and privileges for a hobby than for rural employment, which could be a sustainable source of income to the country and its rural initiatives?
The author is environmental educator and nature walks guide.