Reindeer husbandry in a mountain Sami village in boreal Sweden: the social and economic effect of introducing GPS collars and adaptive forest management

Reindeer husbandry in northern Sweden, Norway, and Finland is an extensive agroforestrysystem, and the management of reindeer occurs alongside other land uses such as forestry, hunting, and tourism. The economic, social, and environmental impact of using GPS collars to track the reindeer was evaluated in the Sami village of Njaarke in boreal Sweden. A second objective was to evaluate how adapted forest managementinfluenced reindeer husbandry. The results show that the use of GPS tracking enables the improved monitoring of the reindeer but the financial costs were greater than the financial benefits. The increased income did not cover the costs of depreciation and maintenance. Whilst the labour inputs associated with reindeer husbandry were high, 30–40% of the gross value addedby village activities were related to hunting, tourism, and the renting of fishing rights. The use of adaptive forest managementwas assumed to increase the number of reindeer that could be reared through to slaughter and it was calculated to increase the gross value addedby reindeer husbandry by more than 30%.