Preface

The erosion of biodiversity is increasingly regarded as a major environmental problem, urgently in need of a remedy. At the same time, the population of large wild fauna is developing in certain regions, particularly in the mountain areas of Europe, America and Africa, where the animals benefit from policies aimed at protecting both species and spaces, operations to introduce, reintroduce and reinforce the presence of species, and a particularly marked agricultural exodus. This special issue of the Revue de Géographie Alpine explores some of the different aspects of this apparently paradoxical situation.

The return of an animal to an area may be considered as a new resource for that area. This is the point of view adopted by Franck Giazzi, Isabelle Ciofolo and Karine Alvès, who present and defend a project for introducing the ostrich {Strnthio camelus camelus) to the Aïr massif (Niger), a project they see as an excellent opportunity for reconciling ecology and cultural and economic development in the region. In a second article, Pierre Dérioz and Xavier Grillo, after retracing the evolution of the Mouflon sheep in the Caroux massif (France), since it was first introduced there in the 1950s, analyse the place of this ungulate in the tourist and cynegetic economy as well as the difficulties associated with managing the animal in an area that is becoming reforested. In another article, Marcus Ednarsson presents the results of a survey on the interest shown by tourism entrepreneurs in the county of Varmland (Sweden) in large predators, particularly wolves, as a new resource to be exploited. They also relate this interest to the personal attitudes of entrepreneurs regarding these animals.

However, the return of large wild fauna does not only represent new opportunities. It is also a source of stories and rumours, which Ketil Skogen, Isabelle Mauz and Olve Krange present, compare and attempt to interpret in the two regions where they conducted their survey: the south-east of Norway and the French Alps. This return of wild animals has also given rise to opposition and conflict, particularly in the agricultural world, as Coralie Mou- net shows from her interviews conducted in several massifs in the French Alps on the presence of the wolf and the wild boar. It has also led to new public policies which, as Sophie Bobbé shows in relation to the management of wolves in France and Spain, are far from being standardised in their approach, but instead hesitate between the eco-centric approach, which initially dominated, and a more socio-centric approach.

This issue of the RGA does not claim to deal with every aspect of the question and in particular leaves to one side the changes in pastoral, hunting, tourism and scientific practices which have accompanied the return or arrival of large wild fauna. However, it does reveal the geographical extent of the phenomenon and the diversity of the animals concerned, even though the wolf, which figures in four of the six articles, is once again considerably over-represented. It also demonstrates that this phenomenon has given rise to varied approaches, analyses and viewpoints among researchers and that the scientific community, on this point as on others, is no more unanimous than the rest of society.

Isabelle Mauz

Journal of alpine research 2006 N°4