The mild winters of the past two years, acorn years and the abundance of fruit have led to many wild boars surviving - and reproducing rapidly.
When the wild boar population increased sharply in 2024, the number of traffic accidents involving wild boars also rose sharply, from 5,700 in 2023 to 9,200 in 2024.
The rapid increase in hunting accidents involving wild boar has now stopped. But we still have a record-sized population, says Anders Broby, an administrator at the Wildlife Analysis Unit at the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency.
Increased hunting
The Swedish Environmental Protection Agency, which is responsible for wildlife management, estimates that there are currently over 570,000 wild boars before hunting and 325,000 after the hunting season. The agency has not set a target for how large the population should be, but the Environmental Protection Agency, as well as the Swedish Hunters' Association and the Swedish Farmers' Association, believe that it needs to decrease, but to different degrees.
For this to be successful, hunting must increase significantly.
Hunters have to shoot a lot to break the upswing and the high shooting rate must continue for a few years to bring the population down to a lower level, says Anders Broby.
Wild boars may be hunted all year round, but not sows with piglets. Technical aids such as night vision are now permitted when hunting. New rules were introduced in 2024 that facilitate the handling and sale of wild boar meat, for example, hunters can sell small quantities of meat directly to consumers and retailers.
Heavy bureaucracy
Hunters want to shoot more wild boar, but regulations mean that reselling wild boar meat is still expensive and administratively complicated, according to the Swedish Hunters' Association. Requirements for trichinosis and cesium tests, cold chains, traceability protocols and veterinary inspections drive up the price.
This leads to Sweden importing wild boar meat from the rest of Europe, even though there are plenty of wild boar in the Swedish forests.
Carl-Johan Djurstedt Holm, Secretary General of the Swedish Hunters' Association, wants to see more simplifications in the regulations and so-called dynamic procurement in the municipalities.
By allowing public kitchens to purchase wild boar meat when supply is greatest - during the autumn and winter hunting season - demand can increase and give hunters an incentive to shoot more animals, he says.
The costs of damage to agricultural crops caused by wild boars are estimated at approximately SEK 300 million in 2023, in a report from the Swedish Board of Agriculture.
The Swedish Farmers' Association, LRF, proposes regulated feeding, permission to hunt in connection with the use of agricultural machinery and permission to search for wild boars using drones, as well as changing the rules for wild boar traps, with the aim of reducing the population. LRF warns that if nothing is done, the wild boar population could have increased to one million animals in four years.
The Swedish Hunters' Association believes that the current regulations are fully sufficient and that it is now mainly a matter of local cooperation to regulate the wild boar population where needed.
The association also points out that there is already the possibility of exceptions for hunting in connection with the use of agricultural machinery, as well as for using technical aids such as drones after application to the county administrative board.
Wildlife management is based on three pillars: rare species must be preserved, wildlife must be used as a resource, and damage caused by wildlife must be limited.
Anders Broby, an administrator at the Wildlife Analysis Unit at the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency, describes wildlife management as a three-legged stool: there must be a balance between the three - otherwise the stool will tip over.
The basic principle of wildlife management is that decisions should be made at the lowest level possible, locally or regionally.
Source: Swedish Environmental Protection Agency.
