Dear Stakeholders and Customers,
Natural England is today (21 September) launching an eight-week public call for evidence as part of its review of ‘wild take’ licensing – the practice of taking birds of prey from the wild for falconry and aviculture. Natural England is responsible for determining applications for such licences on behalf of the Environment Secretary and is leading the current review with support from Defra. Wild take licensing has been suspended while this review takes place.
Falconry, aviculture, conservation and welfare groups, academic experts, public bodies, and members of the public are all invited to submit their views and provide supporting information and evidence on issues including the modern practice of falconry and aviculture in England, potential alternatives to sourcing birds from the wild, the conservation and welfare implications of licensed wild take, and the risks associated with the illegal export trade.
The call for evidence is open to anyone to respond to and seeks information from all stakeholders with an interest in the future direction of wild take licensing in England. Both individual and organisational respondents are asked to provide evidence to support their views where appropriate and to signal if they are willing to be contacted to take part in follow-up interviews and workshops on this topic.
Please do share the above link with others that you think may be interested in responding, including your organisation’s networks and membership where relevant. The deadline for submitting a response is 15 November. For further information, please see our news story on this topic. If you have any questions at all, please contact the project team directly at WildTakeReview@naturalengland.org.uk.
Kind regards,
Wild Take Review Project Team
Natural England