Das Netzwerk Alpiner Schutzgebiete
Registrations are now open for the Sondrio Festival 2019 – an International Documentary Film Festival on Parks (33rd edition, Sondrio, Italy, from November 11th to 24th 2019).The Festival is open to film-makers of documentaries featuring naturalistic, ethnographic and managerial aspects of National Parks, Nature Reserves and other types of Protected Areas. Films selected for the Festival will be considered for the First Prize “Town of Sondrio" Award (4,000 Euros), the “Stelvio National Park” Award (3,000 Euros) and, for films shot in the European Union, the “Lombardy Region” Award (3,000 Euros). Other prizes include the “Audience Jury” Award, the “Students Jury” Award and the “Renata Viviani” Special Award (1,500 Euros), assigned by a special Jury of representatives of the Italian Alpine Club. The Festival organization may create new categories out of competition for films that address environmental, agricultural and conservation issues, as well as sustainable development and human activities. Films should be entered sent not later than 20th May 2019. There is no entry fee. The Festival is managed by ASSOMIDOP, an association comprising Sondrio Town Council, the Italian Alpine Club, the B.I.M. Consortium, the Stelvio National Park and Orobie Valtellinesi Nature Park.
On Thursday April 11th, 2019, the new regional platform of the Alpine network ALPARC CENTR’ALPS was officially founded in Balderschwang, Nagelfluhkette Nature Park (DE). Directly linked by contract to the ALPARC network, the new platform has an association status based on German law.
The creation of a regional platform is based on the decisions of ALPARC’s last three General Assemblies, who decided to put in place a decentralized structure of ALPARC to guarantee concrete work on the ground, a closer proximity towards the managers of the protected areas and local initiatives. ALPARC CENTR’ALPS shares the same objectives and working axes of its “mother organization” and represents a concrete possibility for smaller protected areas and local managers of biodiversity and natural sites to join the network. Thanks to ALPARC CENTR’ALPS there will be an opportunity to gain access to more of the EU’s funding for the central region.
The 10 founding members include protected areas from Germany, Austria, Switzerland, the Swiss Park Network, the Federation of the Austrian Nature Park and the interactive natural museum Inatura located in Dornbin, Germany. The presidency of ALPARC CENTR’ALPS is assured by Peter Oggier, the current president of ALPARC and director of the Nature Park Pfyn-Finges.
To insure a regional presence of the Alpine network with regional contact points and to guarantee the proximity to the protected areas, ALPARC is planning to create a second regional platform in the south-eastern Alps (East of Italy or Slovenia). This will strengthen the network’s activities.
List of the 10 founding members of the ALPARC CENTR'ALPS:
Europarc organise the XI Charter Network Meeting. It takes place in Greece (Tzoumerka, Acheloos Valley, Agrafa and Meteora National Park) between the 9-11th April, with a special post-conference excursion until the 14th April. It is an excellent opportunity to all professionals working and interested in sustainable tourism in protected areas to examine, discuss and learn from each other. Using practical examples and experience from across Europe, this will be a valuable chance to consider how to explore a “sustainable response” to the many social and cultural impact that tourism brings about in Protected Areas.
Registrations are now open, all information available at: www.europarc.org/xi-charter-network-meeting
Like its bigger sister, the quadrennial AlpWeek, Alpweek Intermezzo is an international event on sustainable development and related Alpine issues, jointly organised by key Alpine organisations. The 2019 edition of the event is conceived as a lunch to lunch conference which will bring the main Alpine stakeholders together to meet and exchange views on the topic “Tomorrow in the Alps”.
More information on alpweek.org
The international photography contest “Fotografare il Parco” is now open for its 13th edition. The contest, organized by the Stelvio, Gran Paradiso, Abruzzo-Lazio-Molise and Vanoise National Parks, is a must do for any photographer passionate about mountain wildlife. Although these national parks may seem far from each other, they are all connected through their beauty, natural landscapes, and biodiversity of plants and animals. Participating in this event is an opportunity to enhance these protected areas, since the winners’ photos will be used in the parks’ exhibitions, publications, websites and social networks.
Participants can compete in four categories: The Park Landscape, The Park Wildlife, The Park Microcosmos and natural details, and The Park Plant World. For each category, photographers can send up to four photos either in color or in black and white. Winners will be awarded a cash prize in addition to stays in the national parks and a subscription to the to the magazine “La Rivista della Natura”.
Participation is free of charge and the contest will be open until September 30th, 2019. Participation rules can be found on the Fotografare il Parco website.
Every year, the Permanent Secretariat of the Alpine Convention invites journalists on the We are Alps, a tour across the Alps to experience interesting initiatives in the Alps hands-on and meet various stakeholders, travelling with trains, buses and other sustainable means of transport.
This year, the tour will take place as the “We are Alps Compact” edition, being held on Wednesday 3 April – Thursday 4 April simultaneously to the XV Alpine Conference and focussing on the topics of Climate Change, Natural Hazard and Governance. Excursions in and around Innsbruck (AT) will demonstrate how these three issues are approached, taking into account the particularities of the Alpine natural features. Furthermore, the participants will get the chance to converse with political representatives of the 8 Alpine Countries in the run-up to the XV Alpine Conference (taking place in the morning of 4 April) and participate in the closing Press Conference.
The call is open until Sunday, 10 March for interested journalists from all types of media, particularly from Alpine countries to apply for a place on the tour.
Further information and the application documents can be found on the Alpine Convention’s website.
Alpine Water - common good or source of conflicts?
The proceedings of the FoumAlpinum 2018 and the 7th Water Conference of the Alpine Convention have been published online. The volume contains abstracts of all presentations and posters dealing with questions of water use in the Alpine region and foreseeable future water use conflicts, as well as measures to avoid them. The proceedings also contain a summary of the 7th Water Conference and the results of the mapping of hotspots of water use in the Alpine region, that were recorded during the conference with the participants. The key messages of the ForumAlpinum 2018 are summarized in a policy brief addressed to the Alpine Convention and relevant administrations, entitled „Action needed to prevent future conflict over the use and management of water in the Alpine region in times of climate change and growing demand“.
The ForumAlpinum 2018 has been organised by the International Scientific Committee for Alpine Research (ISCAR) together with the 7th Water Conference of the Alpine Convention and the Macroregion Alpine Space (www.forumalpinum.org).
Download Proceedings: https://doi.org/10.1553/forumalpinum2018
Source: ISCAR
To celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Mont Avic Nature Park, the park organizes an international competition of nature photography called "avic30photocontest".The competition is dedicated to the Alpine nature and aims to promote through photography the knowledge of the Alpine environment and awareness of the value of its protection. The 30th anniverasy of the park is marked by the motto "1989-2019: thirty years between nature and man".
Participate in the contest by sending your best photos on the topic! .
More information are available at www.avic30photocontest.eu
or write to avic30photocontest@montavic.it
The partners of the Alpine Space project YOUrALPS met on February 14th and 15th in the Burgenland to learn from different practices, knowledge and techniques on environmental education.
In the context of a project steering group meeting, the YOUrALPS partners from France, Germany, Italy and Slovenia had the possibility to gain some inspiring knowledge about education practices in the Austrian partner land.
One of the impressive stops was the nature lab in Bad Sauerbrunn, the so called „Werkstatt Natur“, a non for profit institution which was founded by the regional hunter‘s federation. Today, the lab hosts more than 10 000 kids per year which participate in one of the pedagogical programs. There is a wide range of programs according to the varying season and the institution allows also individual programs which are elaborated in cooperation with the teacher of a class. Hence, some programs focus more on re-connecting youngsters to nature by simply bringing them out into the forest and experience the forest according to the very season while others identify a specific topic such as «wildlife and traffic» were they get to know how wildlife perceives and reacts on traffic lights or the „creek hike“ were children discover the role of different living organisms of the water world and may fish for fish. The next stop was dedicated to the use of nature’s ressources such as wild herbs. Uschi Zezelitsch a herb expert and 
hedge witch introduced the group to some of her childrens’programs and creative nature interpretation methodologies. Herbs are a perfect tool to introduce children to the world of natural cooking, taking nature’s ingredients and smelling what nature has to offer. Many of the herbs can directly be picked in nearby meadows, others grow easily in the home gardens or inside a plant pot. This way, children and adolescents can try out making their own herbs salt, herbs bread or even a herb „strudel“. Moreover, delicious juices can be easily prepared with wild mint and ginger for example.
Some of these ideas might be included in the contents of the Alpine school model, one of the major YOUrALPS project outputs, aiming at re-connecting youth to their natural environment. Since September 2017, 14 pilot sites have been carrying out activities on education for sustainable development in order to validate the theoretical model and be certified as « Alpine school ». The Alpine School model will be presented at the conference: “ Learning and networking for sustainable development in the Alps. The Alpine School & Our Alps network.“ on May 14 and 15 in Morbegno (Italy)
For further information please see:
https://www.alpine-space.eu/projects/youralps/en/home
https://www.werkstatt-natur.at/
http://www.uschi-zezelitsch.at/
On Thursday 21 February, the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes Region was awarded with the “2018 Marianne d'or “ for sustainable development.
The award was handed over to Etienne Blanc, Senior Vice-President of the Region, and Eric Fournier, Vice-President in charge of Environment and Sustainable Development, Energy and Regional Natural Parks. This prize recognizes "an exemplary of the region in supporting of an innovative ecological transition". The Marianne d'Or for sustainable development is a "concrete indicator of field initiatives settled by motivated policy makers, private companies and engaged citizens" the committee points out. Created in 1984 during the first French decentralization actions, the Marianne d'Or competition is the first civical competition in France, with the objective of disseminating good practices led by local authorities.
Awareness-raising and communication actions on human-nature conflicts in nature and mountain sports are growing throughout the Alpine region. To support nature conservation and to reduce the disturbance of wildlife by winter sports, flyers, web pages, videos, events and meetings have been developed in several Alpine protected areas under the umbrella of the international initiative “Be Part of the Mountain”.
Some Protected Areas in the front line
This winter, the Vanoise National Park (France) has launched an awareness campaign on this subject, disseminating awareness messages and information on the needs of wildlife. Several communication tools have been produced with the slogan “Be Part of the Mountain” and a specific graphic design as well as t-shirts, stickers and flyers. The initiative is also supported by different local ambassadors from the field of sport for a wider dissemination of the campaign throughout the country.
In the Ecrins National Park (France) the rangers organize meetings, events, animations on the theme of winter wildlife disturbance and especially on the topic "traces and clues" for the general public including youngsters. The Park has been involved in this topic for several years with the “Chuut!” campaign.
In Italy, the Aree Protette dell’Ossola with CIPRA IT, also based on the BpM campaign, are developing several activities in the frame of the RESICETS project.The initiative involves several stakeholders of the tourism sector and aims at developing information paths for tourists, awareness-raising campaigns and training courses for local stakeholders on the impact of tourism on wildlife.
A common communication strategy: “Be Part of the Mountain”
The “Be part of the Mountain” initiative was launched by ALPARC in 2018. It is an Alps-wide communication campaign that allies protected areas, nature protection organisations, public bodies, Alpine clubs and ambassadors – across the Alps, aiming at facilitating the exchange of good practices, developing common awareness-raising tools and implementing joint communication action to initiate behavioural change in outdoor participants. The video presenting the campaign is available here. At present, 8 members have officially signed the charter and others have expressed their interest in joining the initiative.
Are you interested in the initiative? Join the BpM campaign and sign the charter!
For more information see: https://bepartofthemountain.org/en/
Further information about some initiatives in protected ares: