Accidents, especially fatal, have been down for twenty years, according to data from the French Biodiversity Office. However, this is alarmed by a recent increase in the proportion of non-chasers.
mo12345lemonde with AFP
After several months of debate, the government will announce its decisions on Monday, January 9, to better secure hunting practice and reduce the number of accidents. The most radical idea of consultation is the creation of a day – or at least half a day – without hunting at the national level, but anti -chase hunters and activists seem to believe that a Sunday prohibition is excluded .
According to figures, published in September 2022, of the French Biodiversity Office (OFB), which issues permits in France and participates in the hunting police, the number of accidents has been tends to decrease since twenty years. For the 2021-2022 season, the OFB identified 90 (bodily injuries linked to the use of a weapon), ten more than the previous season, but much less than the approximately 180 accidents that the office In the early 2000s.
The trend is similar for fatal accidents, which were divided by three compared to the early 2000s. Nearly thirty each year, they went to eight last season, including two with victims who did not participate Not at the hunt: a 25 -year -old walker, killed in February 2022 on a Cantal hiking trail by a 17 -year -old hunter, and a 67 -year -old motorist, affected in November 2021 in her car near Rennes.
non-compliance with safety rules
Of the last twenty years, 88 % of victims of hunting accidents (dead and injured) were hunters. Over the period, 29 % of accidents are even self-accidents where the hunter is injured or kills himself. This weekend again, an 84-year-old man who put his weapon in his car accidentally killed in Haute-Corse.
But the last season was “marked by a significant increase in the proportion of non-chase victims”, which increased to 26 %, against 12 % on average over twenty years.
In general, accidents are, “for the very large majority, the result of human faults linked to non-compliance with basic safety rules”, underlines the OFB. The Office alerts in particular on a “significant increase” of the proportion of shots towards roads, trails and dwellings, especially hunting for small game, where they caused 32 % of accidents in 2020-2021, against 15 % previous season. Ofb also cites among the main causes non-compliance with the angle of shooting and poor manipulation of weapons.
alcohol offense
Besides, among the tracks selected to better supervise the practice of hunting is a better training, in particular via the “decennial upgrades” of hunters. This reminds them of the principles of security and so far relates essentially to theoretical elements.
A hardening of sanctions after an accident is also mentioned, as is the government’s establishment of a alcohol crime, like what is done for motorists. A “derisory” option, despair the leaders of the Bird Protection League (LPO), but which collects the assent of the hunters.
To better inform residents and walkers, a mobile application whose contours are still vague should be created to list the hunting areas … or non-chases. But nothing that responds to the hope of the anti-chase camp.
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“If the Hunting Safety Plan was finally limited to a few measures such as the ban on drumping in intoxication (it’s still the least Things!) Or the idea of a mobile application so that the voluntary hunters will argue, the government will greatly disappoint the four French French people who would like Sunday without hunting “, loose Matthieu Orphan, Managing Director of the LPO.
Confirmation, or a surprise, is scheduled for Monday morning.