The movement Save the Bufale takes to the streets on the day of 'shame' as the buffalo farmers have defined it. After a year of complaints and proposals, what is happening is no longer tolerable. The farmers are asking for an account of the health disaster that is taking place in the sector where BRC and TBC are expanding and spreading in the Province of Caserta, which is decimating dozens of farms. During the protest that took place this morning in the province of Caserta, the farmers asked that politics and institutions assume their responsibilities.
The Commission Agriculture of the Senate has decided to establish the Commission of Inquiry into what is happening in the Bufalino sector: “On March 23 we will discuss with the European Commission the request that Europe use its powers (up to infringement proceedings) to ensure that the Campania Region stops evading community directives and is obliged to respect international scientific conventions" say the breeders.
Gianni Fabbris on behalf of the Coordination said: “In the meantime we wait for the Regional Council of Campania realizes what it committed to do now 5 months ago and of which all traces have been lost (the convening of the two competent commissions to evaluate and propose the changes to the Plan) and we insist that the National Government guarantees the opening of an institutional discussion) we announce that in the next few days we will produce further documents to Public Prosecutor's Office and Criminal Court to ask for them to happen Responsibilities for what for us today is no longer just the evidence of damage to animals and businesses but directly involves health risks for citizens. If the BRC and TBC eradication plan has among its main objectives that of averting the effects and risks for human health, then the verification of its results can no longer be postponed. If, as would happen with an objective verification of the numbers, the verification of the results certified the fact that both BRC and TBC in the province of Caserta (where national and community regulations are evaded in the name of an emergency strategy) then it is the duty of the Magistrate to ascertain whether there are responsibilities in the institutional chain that is managing the Plan up to evaluating the crime of spreading an epidemic"
The Save the Hoax Movement, with the demonstration on the occasion of the Day of Shame, will continue its work by underlining that "the mobilization of the breeders will stop only with the achievement of the objectives, which today are 4 as we have clarified in the last few days and which are summarized in the main request: the delegation to the task force led by Antonio Limone be withdrawn which proposed and managed the failed plans of recent years and be returned to the National Reference Centre for Brucellosis, the highest national authority which has already managed the Plan with positive results between 2007 and 2011, bringing the BRC from 17% to 0.8%”.
“The Caserta buffalo dispute is an absolute example of the attack that small and medium-sized businesses are also suffering in Campania, the backbone of the Italian economy that risks disappearing”. This is what the Secretary General of the National Workers' Confederation (C.NA.L.) Salvatore Ronghi, commenting on today's demonstration of Caserta buffalo breeders, stated. “The story of the slaughter of over 100 thousand animals due to suspected infection, which were later found to be healthy in post-mortem investigations, and the consequent closure of over 300 small and medium-sized livestock farms, in clear violation of European standards and any scientific principle – he underlines – is a national issue that must be addressed above all in Rome, even more so in light of De Luca's precise and manifest will not to back down even one step with his policies of indiscriminate slaughter, despite the resounding failure of questionable choices that have only led to an increase in cases and cluster zones”. “We need the marches and protests against the Campania Region, but above all we need the implementation by the Meloni government of the principles and specific actions provided for in the order of the day, presented as first signatory by the president of the Agriculture Commission Luca De Carlo and promoted by the Campania senators Petrenga, Rastrelli, Iannone, Cosenza and Matera and approved in the Senate with the favorable opinion of the government on February 15th – Ronghi underlines – with which the buffalo entrepreneur is recognized as the first operator of corporate food safety, his right to the counter diagnosis of cases of infection, promptly only suspected, detected by the ASL blitz, the approval of the provincial plans for the eradication of brucellosis and buffalo tuberculosis by the two competent ministries, Agriculture and Health, the establishment of a monitoring table participated by all the subjects for the constant verification of the implementation of the European standards and the indications of the World Organization for Animal Health, and the traceability of buffalo milk”.
“The fact-finding investigations are good, and even better is the government action that, through the implementation of these points, restores rights, role and dignity to breeders, saves their businesses, safeguards the animals and protects the Caserta buffalo heritage on which too many and too opaque interests have nested”, concludes the national secretary of the Cnal.
Alexander Memoli
Article published on March 11, 2023 - 21pm
