In February 2021, the first event for the Livestock Protection Competence Centers took place. All partners met for a virtual exchange to start the planning of the centres in a coordinated way. Possible locations and farms, the organizational structure as well as the requirements and compensation of expenses for farms were discussed.
What is a Livestock Protection Competence Center?
The idea of the Livestock Protection Competence Centers can be summarized as follows: In each of the participating countries (Bavaria, Austria and South Tyrol / Trentino), suitable and already existing farms will be used as Livestock Protection Competence Centers at different locations. Here, courses on the topic of livestock protection will be offered in the future and questions from other farmers will be answered. In the courses, grazing animal owners will be trained, for example, to set up electric fences in such a way that they effectively protect grazing animals from attacks. Locations are selected to cover a variety of situations: High and low mountain ranges as well as valley locations. A Livestock Protection Competence Center can consist of one or more farms. In this way, different operational situations and animal species can be covered. For example, if there are sheep and a seminar room on one farm, and a horse farmer and a cattle farm in the surrounding area, these can join together to form a joint Livestock Protection Competence Center.
Who can become a Livestock Protection Competence Center?
The farms by no means have to operate exemplary livestock protection right from the start: At least one person per farm receives intensive training from the project, and fences can be set up or supplemented together during the courses. An interest of the farm in the topic livestock protection is however a condition. Some interested farms have already been contacted by the project. Others contacted us on their own initiative and showed interest in becoming a Livestock Protection Competence Center. Contacting will continue in the coming weeks. The next step will be an online information event for all interested farms.
After the locations are then determined in the summer and the course concept is worked out, the first courses can be started in autumn 2021. The greatest focus of the courses will be on practical implementation: participants will spend most of their time building fences together in the field, identifying possible sources of error and solving tricky situations. In this way, everyone also benefits from the experience of the other participants as they learn together.
More Information?
If you are interested to become as a livestock protection competence center, please fill out the form.
