Netherlands

Regulations by topic

Permits

The hunting-firearm activity has become an environmental permit

The Omgevingswet defines the hunting-firearm and falconry activities and subjects them to nature-protection or safety rules.

Dutch vocabulary changed with the act. The Omgevingswet defines the hunting-firearm activity (jachtgeweeractiviteit) as the use of a gun to kill animals living in the wild, and the falconry activity (valkeniersactiviteit) as the use of a bird to catch or kill an animal. It also defines the hunting-right holder (jachthouder) as the person entitled under article 8.3 to exercise the hunt in a hunting field, and the hunting field (jachtveld) as land designated for or suited to hunting. Both activities now fall under the environmental permit regime. Article 5.29a sets the compass for assessment in a single sentence: for a hunting-firearm activity or a falconry activity, the rules referred to in article 5.18 are laid down with a view to nature conservation or safety. The act further arranges which authority is competent for an application concerning a single hunting-firearm activity, special provisions for those activities, and a specific administrative appeal against the environmental permit granted for a hunting-firearm activity.

Regulations

Netherlands: four possible holders of the hunting right, never two at once

Article 8.3 names four people who may hunt on a field — and states that they exclude one another.

Since 1 January 2024 the Dutch nature protection act (Wet natuurbescherming) has been repealed: wetten.overheid.nl carries the note “Regeling vervallen per 01-01-2024”. Hunting now sits under the Omgevingswet, and that is the text to read — many secondary sources still cite the repealed act. Article 8.3 lists who may exercise the hunt in a hunting field (jachtveld), noting that these capacities exclude one another: the owner of the land; the ground-lease holder or usufructuary, unless the owner reserved the hunting right when that right was created and unless the hunting right had already been let at the time; the tenant, unless the lessor was not himself entitled to hunt when the lease was concluded or reserved the right, and unless the right had already been let; and finally whoever rented the hunting right by written, dated agreement for at least six and at most twelve years from the person entitled at the time. Subletting is allowed only under strict conditions: with the land user's consent where the lessor is not also the land user, or with the consent of the person who let the right, and only if the hunting right is re-let in its entirety. The agreement may not depart from article 226(1) to (3) of Book 7 of the Civil Code and contains neither an option nor an extension clause.