Please ensure Javascript is enabled for purposes of website accessibility
In Sweden's Arctic, Ice Atop Snow Leaves Reindeer Starving
gvw_ap_news
By Associated Press
Published 5 years ago on
December 10, 2019

Share

KIRUNA, Sweden — Thick reindeer fur boots and a fur hat covering most of his face shielded Niila Inga from freezing winds as he raced his snowmobile up to a mountain top overlooking his reindeer in the Swedish arctic.

“If we don’t find better areas for them where they can graze and find food, then the reindeers will starve to death.” — Niila Inga
His community herds about 8,000 reindeer year-round, moving them between traditional grazing grounds in the high mountains bordering Norway in the summer and the forests farther east in the winter, just as his forebears in the Sami indigenous community have for generations.
But Inga is troubled: His reindeer are hungry, and he can do little about it. Climate change is altering weather patterns here and affecting the herd’s food supply.
“If we don’t find better areas for them where they can graze and find food, then the reindeers will starve to death,” he said.
Already pressured by the mining and forestry industry, and other development that encroach on grazing land, Sami herding communities fear climate change could mean the end of their traditional lifestyle.
Slipping his hand from a massive reindeer skin mitten, Inga illustrated the problem, plunging his hand into the crusted snow and pulling out a hard piece of ice close to the soil.
Unusually early snowfall in autumn was followed by rain that froze, trapping food under a thick layer of ice. Unable to eat, the hungry animals have scattered from their traditional migration routes in search of new grazing grounds.

The Arctic Is Warming Twice as Fast as the Rest of the Globe

Half the herd carried on east as planned, while the rest retreated to the mountains where predators abound, and the risk of avalanches is great.
Elder Sami herders recall that they once had bad winters every decade or so, but Inga said that “extreme and strange weather are getting more and more normal, it happens several times a year.”
The arctic is warming twice as fast as the rest of the globe. Measurements by the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute show the country has warmed 1.64 degrees Celsius (2.95-degree Fahrenheit) compared with pre-industrial times. In Sweden’s alpine region, this increase is even greater, with average winter temperatures between 1991 and 2017 up more than 3 degrees Celsius (5.4-degree Fahrenheit) compared with the 1961-1990 average.
Snowfall is common in these areas, but as temperatures increase, occasional rainfall occurs — and ‘rain-on-snow’ events are having devastating effects. The food is still there, but the reindeer can’t reach it. The animals grow weaker and females sometimes abort their calves while the survivors struggle to make it through the winter.
“We have winter here for eight months a year and when it starts in October with bad grazing conditions it won’t get any better,” Inga said.
That is devastating to Sami herders, a once-nomadic people scattered across a region that spans the far north of Sweden, Norway, Finland and the northwestern corner of Russia. Until the 1960s, this indigenous minority were discouraged from reindeer herding and their language and culture were suppressed. Today, of the 70,000 Sami, only about 10% herd reindeer, making a limited income from meat, hides and antlers crafted into knife handles.

Photo of reindeer in the snow
In this Wednesday, Nov. 27, 2019 photo, reindeer roam the forest close to a weather station near Kiruna set up by Stockholm University where a collaboration between reindeer herders and scientists is attempting to shed light on dramatic weather changes and develop tools to better predict weather events and their impacts. Unusual weather patterns in Sweden’s arctic region seem to be jeopardising the migrating animals’ traditional grazing grounds, as rainfall during the winter has led to thick layers of snowy ice that block access to food. (AP Photo/Malin Moberg)

Herders Have Started Working With Stockholm University

“Everyone wants to take the reindeers’ area where they find food. But with climate change, we need more flexibility to move around,” said Sanna Vannar, a young herder from a community living in the mountains surrounding Jokkmokk, an important Sami town just north of the Arctic Circle. “Here you can’t find food, but maybe you can find food there, but there they want to clear-cut the forest and that’s the problem.”

“Everyone wants to take the reindeers’ area where they find food. But with climate change, we need more flexibility to move around. Here you can’t find food, but maybe you can find food there, but there they want to clear-cut the forest and that’s the problem.” Sanna Vannar, a young herder from a community living in the mountains surrounding Jokkmokk
The 24-year-old is the president of the Swedish Sami Youth organization and, together with eight other families elsewhere in the world, they launched a legal action in 2018 to force the European Union to set more ambitious targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Earlier this year, the European General Court rejected their case on procedural grounds, but the plaintiffs have appealed.
“We’ve said we don’t want money because we can’t buy better weather with money,” Vannar said. “We’ve said we need that the EU take action and they need to do it now.”
The EU’s new executive Commission is expected to present a ‘European Green Deal’ on Wednesday, to coincide with a U.N. climate conference in Madrid.
Herders have also started working with Stockholm University, hoping to advance research that will broaden understanding about changing weather patterns.
As part of this rare collaboration between Sami and science, weather stations deep in the forests of the Laevas community are recording air and ground temperature, rainfall, wind speed and snowfall density. Sami ancestral knowledge of the land and the climate complements analysis of data gathered, offering a more detailed understanding of weather events.

Rosqvist Hopes This Research Can Help Sami Communities

“With this data we can connect my traditional knowledge and I see what the effects of it are,” says Inga who has been working on the project since 2013 and has co-authored published scientific papers with Ninis Rosqvist, a professor of Natural Geography at Stockholm University.
Rosqvist directs a field station operating since the 1940s in the Swedish alpine region measuring glaciers and changes in snow and ice. But through the collaboration with Inga, she realized that less “exciting” areas in the forests may be most crucial to understanding the impacts of changing climate.
“As a scientist I can measure that something is happening, but I don’t know the impact of it on, in this case, the whole ecosystem. And that’s why you need their knowledge,” she said.
Rosqvist hopes this research can help Sami communities argue their case with decision-makers legislating land use rights.
Back in the forest, Inga is releasing onto the winter pastures a group of reindeer that had been separated from the herd when the animals scattered earlier in autumn.
Several other herders have spent more than a week high in the mountains searching for the other half of the herd and trying to bring the animals down, to no avail.
“As long as they are forced to stay there, they’ll get into worse and worse condition,” he warned.
[activecampaign form=29]

DON'T MISS

‘Once in a Lifetime’ Snow Hits Parts of the US South

DON'T MISS

Trump Temporarily Halts Leasing and Permitting for Wind Energy Projects

DON'T MISS

Fresno Man Who Dealt Deadly Fentanyl Pill Gets 80-Month Prison Term

DON'T MISS

What’s Next for EVs as Trump Moves to Revoke Biden-Era Incentives?

DON'T MISS

US Throws out Policies Limiting Arrests of Migrants at Sensitive Locations like Schools, Churches

DON'T MISS

Visalia Police Find Man Shot Near Shopping Center. Tips Sought.

DON'T MISS

Convicted Jan. 6 Rioter Benjamin Martin Still Going to Prison

DON'T MISS

Is Lawsuit on Planned Reedley Job Center a ‘Shakedown’?

DON'T MISS

Much of the Damage from the LA Fires Could Have Been Averted

DON'T MISS

CA Sued the Tar Out of Trump the First Time Around. How Did It Do?

UP NEXT

Musk’s Straight-Arm Gesture Embraced by Right-Wing Extremists

UP NEXT

Facing Setbacks and Desertions at the Front, Ukraine Detains Commanders

UP NEXT

Palestinians Confront a Landscape of Destruction in Gaza’s ‘Ghost Towns’

UP NEXT

Trump’s Executive Orders: Reversing Biden’s Policies

UP NEXT

Canada Relieved Trump Doesn’t Impose Tariffs on the Major US Trading Partner on First Day

UP NEXT

Ceasefire: Hamas Returns 3 Israeli Hostages, Israel Frees 90 Palestinian Prisoners

UP NEXT

Trump Returns to Power After Unprecedented Comeback, Emboldened to Reshape US

UP NEXT

Trump to Release Records on the Assassinations of the Kennedys and Martin Luther King

UP NEXT

Maria Chiquita Proves Three Legs Are Just as Good as Four

UP NEXT

Walmart Breaks into Luxury Resale Market, Will Offer Chanel, Fendi, Prada, Other Brands

What’s Next for EVs as Trump Moves to Revoke Biden-Era Incentives?

37 minutes ago

US Throws out Policies Limiting Arrests of Migrants at Sensitive Locations like Schools, Churches

43 minutes ago

Visalia Police Find Man Shot Near Shopping Center. Tips Sought.

1 hour ago

Convicted Jan. 6 Rioter Benjamin Martin Still Going to Prison

2 hours ago

Is Lawsuit on Planned Reedley Job Center a ‘Shakedown’?

2 hours ago

Much of the Damage from the LA Fires Could Have Been Averted

4 hours ago

CA Sued the Tar Out of Trump the First Time Around. How Did It Do?

4 hours ago

Israel’s Top General Resigns over Oct. 7 Failures, Adding to Pressure on Netanyahu

4 hours ago

Musk’s Straight-Arm Gesture Embraced by Right-Wing Extremists

4 hours ago

A Heavy Favorite Emerges in the Race to Lead the Democratic Party

5 hours ago

‘Once in a Lifetime’ Snow Hits Parts of the US South

A winter storm sweeping through the U.S. South on Tuesday was dumping snow at levels millions of residents haven’t seen before. Moistu...

3 minutes ago

People walk past the 1900 Storm memorial sculpture on Seawall Blvd. during an icy winter storm on Tuesday, Jan. 21, 2025 in Galveston, Texas. (Brett Coomer/Houston Chronicle via AP)
3 minutes ago

‘Once in a Lifetime’ Snow Hits Parts of the US South

The five turbines of Block Island Wind Farm operate, Dec. 7, 2023, off the coast of Block Island, R.I., during a tour organized by Orsted. (AP File)
32 minutes ago

Trump Temporarily Halts Leasing and Permitting for Wind Energy Projects

Photo of Mexican Oxy, fentanyl laced blue pills
32 minutes ago

Fresno Man Who Dealt Deadly Fentanyl Pill Gets 80-Month Prison Term

President Donald Trump talks about the Endurance all-electric pickup truck, made in Lordstown, Ohio, at the White House, Sept. 28, 2020, in Washington. (AP File)
37 minutes ago

What’s Next for EVs as Trump Moves to Revoke Biden-Era Incentives?

A Border Patrol truck rides along the border wall in Sunland Park, N.M., Tuesday, Jan. 21, 2025. (AP/Andres Leighton)
43 minutes ago

US Throws out Policies Limiting Arrests of Migrants at Sensitive Locations like Schools, Churches

Police are investigating after a man was found shot near a Visalia shopping center and transported to Kaweah Health.
1 hour ago

Visalia Police Find Man Shot Near Shopping Center. Tips Sought.

2 hours ago

Convicted Jan. 6 Rioter Benjamin Martin Still Going to Prison

2 hours ago

Is Lawsuit on Planned Reedley Job Center a ‘Shakedown’?

Help continue the work that gets you the news that matters most.

Search

Send this to a friend