Dear European rangers,
July is probably both high season and World Ranger Day month for many of you. As we observe a minute's silence today, perhaps even now at 12pm CEST, in memory of all rangers who have lost their lives in the line of duty, guided tours are taking place across Europe and the world at the same time. While many of them raise consciousness for the important, often dangerous job we all do, we want to celebrate one thing above all: the solidarity of the big ranger family!
A series of wonderful stories about how Rangers help Rangers across borders have reached us in our countdown to this year's World Ranger Day – a big thank you for this!
These and the many barely told stories of standing up for each other from the global ranger family are encouraging in view of the sad figures, which once again this year show how urgently we need more recognition and appropriate equipment for the profession of ranger. For surely one or two of the tragic 140 deaths of Rangers on duty last year, which we have to mourn again today, could have been prevented.
Against this background, your solidarity is vital. To strengthen this even more, we have set up a program to enable international exchange at congresses, training courses and other meetings, especially for those who are unable to afford travel and participation costs: Our Ranger Leaves Program helps rangers to help rangers by enabling them to approach potential sponsors such as companies, private individuals or other institutions via this sponsorship programme. The rangers from our ranks have submitted their first examples. We would be happy to support you with our idea, flyer and more!
Speaking of exchange: tomorrow, 1 August, registration for the World Ranger Congress will reopen for Europe's and Oceania's rangers. We have summarised all the details in a letter to our members, linked in the event information below. Please keep up to date on the congress website and IRF social media channels for reopening time, as it will be announced later today!
A particularly exciting exchange is behind our new ranger double portrait ‘Two Rangers, Two Projects’: Maria from Moldova and Aitor from the Spanish Basque Country not only talk about the development of the ranger profession alongside an information infrastructure for Moldova's protected areas and the successful reintroduction of ospreys in northern Spain. Both agree on the importance of involving locals in ranger work.
And then there are still an unbearable ten months that we, and especially his family, have not known anything about Ohad Yahalomi, one of our rangers, since his abduction. May this uncertainty finally end.
Wishing you all a happy World Ranger Day!
Urs Reif, President of the ERF
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