The NGO Estonian Large Carnivores (Eesti Suurkiskjad) appealed to Tallinn Administrative Court challenging the Environmental Board's order to temporarily suspend the 2024/2025 wolf hunting season.

The Court granted the application for primary legal protection and suspended this year's wolf hunt for the duration of the court proceedings. The Court ruled that the continuation of the hunt could lead to irreversible consequences for the Estonian wolf population, which would be significantly difficult or impossible to rectify at a later date.

According to the Court, the appeal has very good prospects of success, since, according to the case-law of the Court of Justice, the favorable status of the protected species must be ensured when determining hunting quotas. Although the Environmental Board relied on an assessment of the conservation status of the animals' Baltic population, the Court emphasized that, in the Estonian context, it is necessary to assess the status of the species first at local and then national level. If the status of the wolf is deemed favorable, only then should its conservation status at transboundary level be evaluated, if possible.

The Estonian wolf population is classified as "vulnerable" according to the IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) criteria. However, that assessment was not relied upon during the appeal. Under case law in the Court of Justice of the European Union, the authorization for hunting in a situation such as this one is deemed contrary to EU law.

The Court found that the Environmental Board's order targets hunting volumes in areas where there has been damage caused and livestock production affected. However, there was no convincing correlation between hunting volumes and the number of cases of damage caused in the area identified for population management.

According to the Court, interim measures are necessary to avoid irreversible consequences. If the hunting pressure on the wolf population is too high, it could lead to an increase of non-native species the jackal in Estonia. While the damage caused by wolves to livestock may be reduced, it is highly likely that jackals would also start to cause damage to livestock themselves. Such a development could be detrimental to both the natural environment and the interests of livestock farmers in the long term. The Court stressed that it is therefore of the utmost importance to base decisions on hunting rates for wolves on the best available scientific evidence.

The Court noted that the environmental interests, including the preservation of biodiversity, outweigh the possible economic or social concerns that may result from a suspension of wolf hunting. The Court also added that, according to the Environmental Board's hunting proposal, the damage caused to sheep by wolves will have decreased significantly in 2024 (almost 45 percent fewer sheep killed) compared to the previous year, but that the contested order makes no reference to this.

Substantive proceedings will continue to assess whether the Environmental Board's order was lawful and whether the wolf hunt complies with the requirements of both the Estonian Nature Conservation Act and EU law.

Tallinn Administrative Court's order ensures that the Environmental Board's order to hunt wolves will continue to be suspended pending a final court decision. This step is important to avoid a situation where the status of the species deteriorates irreversibly during the litigation process, the Court said.

The order can be challenged before Tallinn Circuit Court within 15 days.

---

Follow ERR News on Facebook and Twitter and never miss an update!