Unpaid search fees push Virolahti hunters to threaten walkout

Some volunteers searching for wild boar in Virolahti have not received promised fees, prompting search leader Jarmo Koskela to withdraw until his fellow hunters are paid, Yle reports.

Nearly 70 hunters were preparing to head into the field on Tuesday. The Finnish Food Authority has promised volunteers 30 euros per hour, but Koskela said about 30 people had received no payment for searches in August. He received his own fee for that work last Friday.

The searches are taking place in an African swine fever infection zone. Hunters look for dead wild boar, whose carcasses are sent to the authority for testing. The searches are intended to establish how widespread the disease is in the area.

The authority’s administrative director, Raimo Pyysalo, said payments had been delayed because some invoices contained discrepancies. Most problems concerned differences between the hours hunters billed and the hours the authority had ordered. The authority has found no evidence of misuse, he said.

Pyysalo said several dozen hunters’ payments were awaiting clarification and apologised for the delays. From October, the authority plans to pay fees twice a month, on the 15th and the last day of each month. He said all hunters would receive the compensation they were owed.