Reindeer Blog

The WWF Global Arctic Programme has just released its quarterly publication ‘The Circle’. This edition has a focus on reindeer herding and caribou, entitled Reindeer and Caribou: Herds and Livelihood in Transition. This edition focusses on a number of themes that are current in the world of reindeer and caribou. Articles cover global warming, wild [...]

Three young Sami reindeer herders from Härjedalen,  Sweden have started a blog where they write about their everyday life as reindeer herders in this area. The reason for the blog is an ongoing law suit, where the Sami villages have lost their rights to reindeer grazing in this area. And while an agreement would appear [...]

One of the largest wind farms in the world is being built in northern Sweden but not everyone is pleased about it. The turbines cut across an area used by Sweden’s indigenous Sámi reindeer herders. An hour’s drive inland from the town of Piteå, a dozen wind turbines tower over the surrounding forest. In the [...]

The Canadian mining company Blackstone ventures has managed to buy the rights to start drilling in the Vindelfjällen nature reserve in the north of Sweden. The company is planning to drill right by one of the most ancient Sámi summer villages still inhabited every summer by the reindeer herders and reindeer  of Grans Sameby, the [...]

A recent study published in the International Journal for Circumpolar Health concluded that reindeer herding Sami in Sweden, most particularly men, were more likely to suffer from depression and anxiety than others.  Entitled “Depression and anxiety in the reindeer-herding Sami population of Sweden” , the objectives were to investigate symptoms and predicting factors of depression [...]

The Saami Council, the NGO that represents the Sami people in all four countries in which they live have released a strongly worded press release criticising the German bank KfW IPEX for their funding of a giant wind power project in Sami reindeer herding areas, in contravention of the OECD Convention on Multilateral Enterprises. In [...]

Between 2-400 reindeer have drowned in a river near Jokkmokk in northern Sweden after thin surface ice cracked while the herd were moving to their winter pastures. Reindeer herders in the region were taking around 3,000 animals across the river, a route that has been safely crossed on previous occasions. ”The ice suddenly gave way [...]

Heavy calves survive Preliminary results from Swedish University of Agriculture Sciences (SLU) by researcher Birgitta Åhman show there is a relationship between female reindeer condition, the weight of calves and calf survival. “This can help the herders in their choice of which reindeer should remain in the herd,” she says.

Norwegian Foreign Minister Jonas Gahr Støre will exploit Swedish leadership role in the EU and the Barents co-operation to get wider European interest in the North and the Arctic. – From a Norwegian point of view, it is interesting that Sweden in a few month, have the Presidency of both EU and Barents Cooperation. Wednesday [...]

On Wednesday, October 7th, the Ministers of Agriculture in Norway and Sweden signed the new Norwegian-Swedish Reindeer Grazing Convention. The Convention contains provisions for how reindeer herding is conducted over the border. The background to the negotiations is that the 1972 Reindeer Grazing Convention expired in 2005 and had to be replaced with a new [...]