Two national parks have experienced major changes in their highest management unit : in the National park Gran Paradiso, Michele Ottino has already retired while the director of the National Park Kalkalpen Erich Mayrhofer will retire at the end of the year.

Special thanks to Erich Mayrhofer – Director of the Kalkalpen National Park
At the end of the year, Erich Mayrhofer will retire after managing the park for 25 years. It was only recently, in November 2017, that 5,250 hectares of beech forests of the Kalkalpen and 1,965 hectares in the Dürrenstein wilderness reserve were declared as the first Austrian UNESCO World Heritage Site.  Governor Mag. Thomas Stelzer forwarded the certificate to the officials of the Kalkalpen National Park, giving special thanks to Erich Mayrhofer for his long-term professional and personal engagement to promoting the protection and sustainable use of the park. “The Mayrhofer era is a success story” he states. Mayrhofer’s main concern was the promotion of slow tourism, this way raising awareness in different target groups of the sustainable development issues in the protected area.  Mayrhofer will be succeeded by Volkhard Maier who will be in charge of the park from January 2018

Gran Paradiso National Park welcomes its new Director Antonio Mingozzi
Michele Ottino, who had led the park’s activities since 1998, has been succeeded by Prof. Antonio Mingozzi. The new director is Associated Professor of Zoology at the University of Calabria and teaches Ecology at the Veterinary University of Turin. Antonio Mingozzi is looking forward to the new challenge, acknowledging the high levels of responsibility associated with it “This new assignment involves a big mission and I’ll face it with all my energy and competencies .I hope that I’ll succeed in reconciling the issues of conservation and the sustainable use of the nature and culture provided by the treasure of the Gran Paradiso National Park.”