Drops of Change: 8 experiences of sustainable water management in agriculture and livestock farming

Drops of Change: eight experiences of sustainable water management in agriculture and livestock
Interreg-ALCOTRA Project “ACLIMO”

The Alps are part of the so-called climate hotspots, areas of the world where climate change manifests earlier and with particular intensity. Temperatures are rising more quickly than the global average, precipitation patterns are changing, exposing areas to extreme events, droughts, and floods, glaciers are retreating at an alarming rate, and snow cover is decreasing year by year. All this results in a decrease in water availability in environments where even minimal changes can pose a concrete threat to the survival of habitats and species, which, due to their alpine nature, are adapted to extremely specific and peculiar conditions.

The lack of water and snow not only impacts lakes, streams, and wetlands, vital environments for the mountains, but also the related economic activities such as agriculture and pastoralism.

In this context, the eight Italian and French Parks that form the partnership of “ACLIMO” have taken on the challenge of studying the evolution of water resources and guiding the territory, data in hand, towards wise water use, proposing adaptation practices for agricultural and pastoral activities that ensure their long-term survival while also conserving the fragile alpine biodiversity.

To do this, they started with those who have already taken the right path by producing a series of eight videos that tell some of the numerous experiences of sustainable water management in agriculture and livestock that have emerged in the area thanks to the commitment of operators in dialogue with institutions, which deserve to be told and promoted.

Filmed during the summer of 2024, the videos take us, through evocative images and the words of the protagonists, along the entire western alpine arc, from Vanoise to the Ligurian Alps and the Cuneo plain, discovering innovative irrigation solutions, new pasture management methods, the challenges of bringing water to the alpine pastures, and the importance of protecting wetlands and their biodiversity from water scarcity.

With global warming threatening both habitats and traditional economic activities in the Alps, what emerges from the testimonies collected in this audiovisual project is that the conditio sine qua non for truly sustainable territorial development is dialogue among stakeholders: it is essential that breeders, farmers, Parks, administrations, and local communities recognize each other's needs and cooperate in the search for shared solutions that allow both the preservation of these activities and the protection of the alpine environment.

The series, titled: “Drops of Change: eight experiences of sustainable water management in agriculture and livestock”, has been curated by the Protected Areas of the Maritime Alps and produced by the Cuneo director Elena Valsania (Feliz). The videos are available in bilingual format (ita-fra) and made available to the general public, trade associations, schools, and universities.

The complete collection of the mini-videos produced by the ACLIMO project is available at the following link.

The videos were produced thanks to the contribution of the European Union - European Regional Development Fund - as part of the Interreg-Alcotra 2021-2027 program