Sweden is starting 2025 with a threat to wipe out half of its endangered wolf population.
The country has a total of 375 recorded wolves and the country’s government has decided that a minimum number of 170 is necessary for ‘favourable conservation status’ instead of the current level of 300.
Anti-hunt campaigners say the move is illegal under current EU law, as according to the Berne convention, protected species cannot be caused to have their populations fall under a sustainable level. However this ruling is set to change later in the year.
Sweden’s wolf population dropped by almost 20 per cent in 2022-23, due to increased levels of hunting. The country had no breeding wolf population from 1966 until 1983, and the species is listed in the country as endangered on the International Union for Conservation of Nature red list.
Lea Badoz, Wildlife Programme Officer at Eurogroup for Animals, said: ‘The wolf is unfortunately the latest political pawn, a victim of misinformation. Downgrading protection will not solve the challenges of coexistence, nor help farmers.
‘Proven coexistence measures must be the priority, and the EU should help through financial means.’
The species is under threat internationally as the European Commission is considering revising its habitats directive to reflect the fact that numbers have increased, particularly in alpine and forested regions of Scandinavia and central Europe.
Farmers say the increased population poses a threat to livestock such as sheep and goats.
Calls for Preventive Measures to Save Wolves
The Berne convention on the conservation of European wildlife and natural habitats voted to change the status of wolves from a ‘strictly protected’ to a ‘protected’ species. This change will enter into force on 7th March and will make it easier for the EU to change the habitats directive to allow more wolves to be shot.
But environmentalists have said that instead of changing the laws to allow wolves to be culled, farmers can take preventive measures with electric fencing.
‘We are very critical to the path that the EU is now taking, downgrading the protection status of the wolf,’ said Magnus Orrebrant, the chair of the Swedish Carnivore Association.
‘If the EU follows up the latest Berne convention decision by changing the wolf’s protection status in the habitat directive, the result will be very negative not only for the wolves, but for all wildlife in Europe.
‘In Sweden, it will have no immediate impact on the wolf population, since the Swedish government since 2010 has been blatantly disregarding the wolf’s special protection status, allowing a yearly licensed quota hunt and thereby breaking EU law. We filed a formal complaint to the EU commission, leading to an infringement procedure against Sweden, as yet to no avail.’
The scientific name of the Scandinavian grey wolf is Canis lupus. In northern Europe the species has always been hunted for fur and to keep them away from domestic livestock. By the late 1800s, organised efforts to keep the wolf population low led to their eradication from most parts of Norway and Sweden and in 1960 they were officially claimed extinct.
In the early 1980’s three wolves migrated from the Russian-Finnish population all the way to the county of Varmland in Southern Sweden and these animals founded the modern wolf population in the country.
The EU move could threaten other wildlife across the continent, according to Dr Joanna Swabe, Senior Director of Public Affairs at Humane Society International/Europe.
‘The EU decision-making on lowering legal protections for wolves sets a dangerous precedent for other European species, such as bears and lynx. All decision-making relating to the protected status of wildlife species must be based on robust scientific evidence,’ she said.
‘Instead, decisions on wolves have clearly been driven by political expediency and succeed only in appeasing vocal interest groups, such as hunters, who prefer to take recourse to rifles, rather than seeking coexistence with large carnivores.’
