Wildtier Schweiz: Research Label, Hobby Hunting Core

Wildtier Schweiz presents itself to the federal government and the media as a neutral centre of expertise, yet it is co-financed by JagdSchweiz, writes studies on behalf of the hobby hunting umbrella organisation and at the same time manages the federal hunting statistics.

Both before and after Melitta Maradi, hobby hunting personnel have continuously held seats on the management board. Her predecessor Simon Meier today plans wolf kills in the canton of St. Gallen. The 2024 annual accounts also make it visible: the association carries the ZEWO charity seal, yet finances itself to the tune of 98 per cent through contracts.

On 19 July 2026 the managing director of Wildtier Schweiz, Melitta Maradi, will give a talk at the Swiss Hunting Museum in Utzenstorf in favour of bow hunting, which is banned in Switzerland — a spotlight on an association that has presented itself for decades as Switzerland's neutral wildlife biology hub.

An association with a dual appearance

Wildtier Schweiz has been registered as an association under Art. 60 ff. of the Swiss Civil Code since 1982, has its seat at the University of Zurich and is recognised by the canton of Zurich as a charitable organisation. On its own website the association presents itself as a «nationwide centre of expertise for wildlife biology and wildlife management» that advises the federal government, the cantons and the public. Eight employees are spread across roughly 510 per cent of full-time positions. So much for the official picture.

The other image shows the association's Wikipedia page, drawn from its own statutes and annual reports. The official sponsors and supporters are listed there by name: the Swiss Academy of Sciences, Zürcher Tierschutz, the Conference of Hunting and Fishing Administrators, and JagdSchweiz, the national umbrella body of hobby hunting. It is precisely this umbrella body, which in 2025 used a member survey to gauge the mood among Swiss hunters towards reintroducing bow hunting, that sits at the table of that organisation which delivers “scientific” statements on hunting matters. The explicit political demand to reintroduce bow hunting comes from the Association of Swiss Bow Hunters, which states verbatim on its website that the “long-term goal” is the reintroduction of this method. Wildtier Schweiz, through its managing director, provides the scientifically appearing stage for this.

The management comes from hobby hunting

Maradi is a forestry engineer (ETH), a board member of the Swiss Society for Wildlife Biology, and according to a 2019 decree of the cantonal government of Zurich was chairwoman of the Oberland hunting district and thus a member of the cantonal hunting commission. She travels abroad with bow and arrow, to places where the practice banned in Switzerland on animal welfare grounds is permitted. With this CV she today heads the association whose statistics and statements are cited in every second authority consultation.

Her predecessor Simon Meier has been documented on wildbeimwild.com since 2017. For years he shaped the media voice of Wildtier Schweiz in the NZZ, Tages-Anzeiger, Der Bund and SRF, and consistently advocated for more hobby hunting, from hunting wild boars with night-vision sights to the claim that hunted wild animals are “stronger and healthier”. Anyone who reads the same texts against serious wildlife-biological literature will find omissions and one-sided patterns of argumentation, which we have documented in detail under the title “How the hobby hunter Simon Meier leads people onto the wrong trail”. Today Meier heads the hunting division at the Office for Nature, Hunting and Fishing in St. Gallen, an authority whose wolf-shooting practice the Federal Supreme Court has declared unlawful in at least one case.

Personnel continuity from association proximity into the authorities. Whoever runs the business at Wildtier Schweiz is the voice of science for the federal government and the cantons, and in their own free time the voice of hobby hunting.

When JagdSchweiz commissions the research

How closely intertwined this runs is shown by a study that JagdSchweiz itself published: a paper on the “effects of huntability on black grouse, rock ptarmigan, woodcock, brown hare and mountain hare” was commissioned by JagdSchweiz from Wildtier Schweiz. On the JagdSchweiz website, the result can be accessed under the double portrait “Simon Meier, managing director of Wildtier Schweiz, and David Clavadetscher, managing director of JagdSchweiz”. Client and contractor appear together before the public, and the result is, unsurprisingly, that a “sustainable hunt” of these partly endangered species is possible.

The list of huntable species in Switzerland is not decided by the roll of a dice. It is established by the Federal Council in the hunting ordinance, based on data and recommendations that are substantially shaped by Wildtier Schweiz. When JagdSchweiz commissions studies in advance from this very association, that is not a contribution to science but lobbying with an academic veneer.

The federal hunting statistics in hunting-friendly hands

Wildtier Schweiz manages the federal fishing and hunting statistics. This data basis is the foundation for kill figures, comparative values between cantons and political demands. That an organisation supported by the umbrella hobby hunting association collects, processes and comments on these figures is, at the very least, in need of explanation.

The ordinary reader comes across the phrase “according to Wildtier Schweiz” in the NZZ or on SRF and reads it as the voice of science. In fact, they are reading the voice of an organisation that, in terms of personnel and finances, comes from the very milieu it is supposed to assess.

The ZEWO seal without donors

Wildtier Schweiz has carried the ZEWO donation seal since 1986. In Switzerland, this seal is meant to signal trustworthiness towards donors. The 2024 annual accounts, which the association publishes via the ZEWO website, reveal a different reality, however.

Total revenue for 2024 amounts to 818,010 francs. Of this, 7,085 francs come from general donations and 6,703 francs from membership fees. Donations and membership fees together make up 1.7 per cent of the association's budget. The donation side, for which the ZEWO seal is actually intended, effectively does not exist.

The eligibility test, by which ZEWO itself determines which organisations may even aspire to the seal of quality, excludes organisations that are «oriented towards the economic interests of third parties». JagdSchweiz and the cantonal conference of hunting and fishing administrators represent precisely such economic interests, namely those of the hobby hunting industry and its administrative apparatus. But if these organisations are, as documented on Wikipedia, the sponsors and clients of Wildtier Schweiz, then the association meets the ZEWO entry criteria by the letter, yet contradicts the spirit of the provision. A serious recertification review would have to intervene here.

The true sources of income are commissions. 547,292 francs come from «public-sector commissions», that is 67 per cent of the budget. A further 195,629 francs are recorded under «revenue from other commissions», which is another 24 per cent. Who stands behind the «other commissions» is not broken down in the annual accounts. The 2024 annual report merely speaks of «numerous foundations» and «further commissions». The statutory sponsors JagdSchweiz and the conference of hunting and fishing administrators are not named as clients anywhere in the entire published financial communications.

What is remarkable is the growth of this black-box item. The «other commissions» rose from 127,271 francs in 2023 to 195,629 francs in 2024, an increase of 54 per cent in a single year. Precisely during this period, Wildtier Schweiz launched the new product «Wildtier Schweiz researches for you», a series of research articles which, according to its own statement in the annual report, is written «especially for the cantonal hunting administrations».

In the notes to the annual accounts there is another telling sentence: «There are no material transactions with related persons or organisations.» This claim contradicts the governance structure. According to Wikipedia and earlier association documents, JagdSchweiz and the Conference of Hunting and Fisheries Administrators are sponsors of the association. As soon as they place material commissions, they would have to be disclosed as related organisations under Swiss GAAP FER 21. Either the commissions from these associations are genuinely not material — which is surprising given the published joint study on the huntability of black grouse and the like — or they are hidden in the «other commissions» category and deliberately not disclosed by name. Both variants call for explanation.

The trust signal of the ZEWO seal thus covers a practice that eludes independent oversight.

The counter-model is called Geneva

In 1974, the canton of Geneva abolished hobby hunting by popular vote and entrusts wildlife management to twelve professional state game wardens. The immediate kill rate is 99.5 per cent, and the brown hare populations are at a level not matched anywhere else in Switzerland. Bertrand von Arx, Director of Biodiversity for the canton of Geneva, notes that the hunting ban contributes to increasing biodiversity.

Geneva needs no «competence centre» that simultaneously writes studies for JagdSchweiz and keeps the federal statistics. It needs game wardens who master their work, and an administration that is not funded by the lobby it is supposed to control.

Line of argument: What needs to be done

As long as Wildtier Schweiz is treated as a neutral voice in federal communications, lobbying flows into official decisions without the public realising it. Four consequences are clear.

First: a breakdown of the «other commissions». Which specific amounts come from JagdSchweiz, the Conference of Hunting and Fisheries Administrators and individual cantonal hunting administrations? As long as these clients are kept anonymous, the transparency effect of the ZEWO seal is an illusion. A commission relationship exceeding 10’000 francs should be disclosed, with name and amount.

Secondly: review by ZEWO. An organisation that carries the ZEWO donation seal but finances itself 98 per cent through commissions rather than donations abuses the trust that this seal enjoys among the Swiss public. ZEWO must examine whether the certification requirements are still being met, in particular the requirement to disclose significant funders.

Thirdly: separation of functions. Whoever maintains the federal hunting statistics should not at the same time be allowed to carry out commissioned work for the national hobby hunting association or write research articles «especially for the cantonal hunting administrations». The one logically and ethically excludes the other.

Fourthly: a genuine wildlife-biology research body. A federally financed body with no personnel interlocking with hobby hunting, whose staff are not allowed to hold any hunting functions, would deliver what Wildtier Schweiz only pretends to deliver.

Until then, the rule is: when «Wildtier Schweiz says» appears in a media report, a second look is worthwhile. Behind the label stands no neutral science, but an association whose management hunts with bow and arrow, whose former employee now plans the wolf kills in the canton of St. Gallen, and whose donation seal sits atop a commission-based financing whose clients are not disclosed.

Quick links to related dossiers

• Landshuter Dialog in Utzenstorf: bow-hunting panel with well-known hobby hunter faces
• Lying hunter became head of department in the canton of St. Gallen
• The bad apple in the St. Gallen hunting administration
• St. Gallen hunting administration: wolf management without science and without credibility
• Serial public stultification: St. Gallen swears in 65 new hobby hunters
• Office for Hunting and Nonsense in St. Gallen modernises hunting training
• The Geneva model and the abolition of hobby hunting

Sources

• Wildtier Schweiz, annual accounts 2024 (balance sheet, operating statement, notes, audit report by Doris Graf Treuhand dated 16.3.2025), published on zewo.ch
• Wildtier Schweiz, annual report 2024, published on wildtier.ch and zewo.ch
• ZEWO, detail page Wildtier Schweiz, certified since 1986, last certification 2024
• ZEWO, 21 ZEWO standards, in particular Standard 16 (accounting under Swiss GAAP FER 21) and Standard 19 (annual reporting), zewo.ch
• Swiss GAAP FER 21, accounting for charitable non-profit organisations
• Wildtier Schweiz, self-portrayal and staff profiles, wildtier.ch/ueber-uns
• Wikipedia, «Wildtier Schweiz», organisational structure and supporters
• StiftungSchweiz, organisational profile Wildtier Schweiz
• JagdSchweiz, study «Effects of huntability on black grouse, rock ptarmigan, woodcock, brown hare and mountain hare», jagdschweiz.ch
• Decision of the Cantonal Government of Zurich, 2019, confirmation of Melitta Maradi as head of the Oberland hunting district
• NZZ, 3 September 2018, «Almost only exotics support the hunting ban initiative»
• Tages-Anzeiger, 8 September 2018, «Against wild boars with night vision devices»
• SRF Radio 1, 4 February 2021, interview with Simon Meier
• Tages-Anzeiger, «Foxes and roe deer as popular therapy», on the Geneva model
• Federal Supreme Court, ruling on the St. Gallen wolf culling practice
• Swiss Bowhunters Association VSBJ, vsbj.org, association objective and self-description
• JagdSchweiz, member survey on bowhunting 2025, distributed via the cantonal associations (chassefribourgeoise.ch, jagd-tg.ch, revierjagd-solothurn.ch)