French hunters seize election opportunity to defend their cause
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Loading... - Claude Garcon
- 30 Mar 2022
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Some four million people hold a licence to hunt in France, and 1.1 million activate them each year.
“We’re a political force,” William Schraen, president of the National Federation of Hunters (FNC), confidently told a number of presidential candidates at a meeting in Paris last week.
The hunting lobby is strong and even if the majority of French people live in urban areas, no politician with an eye on the Elysée can afford to neglect the rural vote.
“Hunting is part of the soul of the countryside,” says Denis Plat, chief editor at J’aime la Chasse online magazine.
Hunting used to be reserved for the nobility, but the 1789 revolution opened it up to everyone and since then it's become one of the most popular and socially diverse activities in France.
"It goes from workers to CEOs, lawyers or employees ... through to the so-called elite with very exclusive hunting estates," Plat explains. "This is the richness of the French hunting tradition and it gives it real strength."
But opposition, from animal rights campaigners in particular, is growing. Recent polls suggest more than half of French people have a negative view of hunting, and more than two-thirds want restrictions on hunting at weekends.
Plat maintains opponents are "disconnected" from the reality of rural life and don't understand that going out hunting with friends at the weekend is "oxygen" for factory workers.
He particularly dislikes people "who don't know a pheasant from a crow" giving him lessons on animal welfare.
A man’s world
Plat began hunting with his grandfather then father, and held a gun “before the legal age” - typical of a family tradition passed down from father to son.
A few women are joining the pack, too, making up about 3 percent of hunters, according to the FNC.
“It’s not a lot,” admits Sandrine Gueneau, president of the Loire region's hunting federation.
When she began with her Dad, “it was very rare to see women hunting" but that's changing, she says.
"Women are welcome, it's not a sexist domain, I've passed on the passion to my two daughters."
https://s.rfi.fr/media/display/4e1cc4f8-aeb8-11ec-a3ec-005056bf30b7/Sandrine%20hunting.webp
Aware of the need to attract new blood, the FNC recently launched an online campaign, claiming the support of young hunters like Johanna Clermont.
Dressed in the latest gear, posing proudly with her catch of the day, shotgun at her side, Clermont's Instagram account boasts 167,000 followers.
Gueneau doesn’t handle a gun herself but joins in hunts all over France with her dogs, tracking down wildboars, deer and roebucks.
“I don't shoot myself but I'm not opposed to killing animals because part of the role of a hunter is to regulate species," she says.
"I don't feel hunting is violent. Killing the animal is the final act but is it more violent than raising animals to then kill them [for food]?" Read More...
