# Connect to the database
my $dbh = DBI->connect($dsn, $user, $password, { RaiseError => 1, AutoCommit => 0, mysql_enable_utf8 => 1 }) 
or die "Can't connect: ", $DBI::errstr;

my $sql = qq{SET NAMES 'utf8' COLLATE 'utf8_swedish_ci';};
$dbh->do($sql);