Summary: Sweden remains the most popular foreign destination for students, while Romania, Latvia and Ukraine are new favourites.

According to the Finnish Medical Association, an increasing number of young Finns are opting to study medicine abroad. The number of Finns studying medicine in other countries has increased substantially in the past few years and continues to grow every year.
 "The situation has actually exploded in recent years,"  Hannu Halila , Deputy CEO of the Finnish Medical Association (FMA) said. According to the association, 1,120 medical students completed their degrees abroad in the 2018-19 academic year.
 In comparison, this number was around 350 in 2012-13. The FMA's data is based on information about student grants from the Social Insurance Institution (Kela).
 According to Halila, there are several reasons to study abroad. The field of medicine is very similar everywhere, making it fairly easy to study in another country. Additionally, globalisation and interest in foreign countries is increasing. Students also resort to studying abroad as a backup plan when they don't get into Finnish schools.
 Sweden, Estonia, Latvia and Romania popular destinations for students
 Nearly a third of Finnish medical students who studied abroad did so in neighbouring Sweden, while every fifth student studied in Latvia and every tenth student in Estonia.
 Romania has become an increasingly popular destination for Finnish medical students in the past few years, with over 10 percent of students that studied abroad completing their degree there.
 "I've realised that Romania would be cheaper than many other countries. It might also be easier to get in there," Halila said.
 According to the figures, Ukraine has also become a more attractive destination for students. Around 50 Finnish students studied to become doctors in Ukraine in the last academic year. In contrast, the number of students studying in Russia and Hungary dropped in the last couple of years.
 The popularity of Sweden as an academic destination remains constant; the country has been the most favoured location for Finnish medical students since the 2014-15 academic year.
 Latvia's popularity has grown over the last few years, while that of Estonia has remained stable. About 100 Finns are currently studying medicine in Estonia.
 Quality of education basically the same across the EU
 Halila stated that education across the EU meets the union’s minimum quality requirements.
 "For example, there are quite a few inquiries about Romania. It's a fairly new phenomenon, and since no Finnish students have graduated there yet, we do not have information about the standard of education. In Sweden, on the other hand, the education is very similar to here," he said.
 At the end of August, there were a total of 30,900 people registered as doctors with the right to practice at the National Supervisory Authority for Welfare and Health (Valvira).
 Of these, 5,200 received their degrees abroad. However, it is unclear how many of these are Finns who studied abroad and how many are immigrants who came to Finland after graduating elsewhere.
 Doctors who studied abroad more likely to lack credentials
 Kirsi Liukkonen , head of the unit for healthcare supervision at Valvira, said that the organisation has only had to intervene in the practice of foreign-trained doctors in a few isolated incidents.
 "There are a few instances, not even 10 a year. For example, this year so far, there have been two doctors who lacked the necessary medical credentials. Last year there were three and the year before last, five," she said.
 Every year, Valvira intervenes in the medical practice of around 30 doctors. Statistically, doctors who have studied abroad are slightly more likely to fall in this category.
 "The number is small, but in cases where the person's lack of medical knowledge is called into question, foreign degrees turn up a little more often," Liukkonen said. Valvira is usually notified about professional inadequacy by employers with concerns about staff members' professional abilities.

Increasing number of Finns studying medicine abroad


Summary: According to the defence forces commander, more than 19,000 reservists will receive refresher training next year.

Ulkoasiain hallinto, maanpuolustus ja järjestystoimi

Defence Minister  Antti Kaikkonen  has said that the number of refresher training and volunteer exercises for military reservists will be increased next year. At the inauguration of the National Defence Courses in Helsinki on Monday, Kaikkonen announced that the number of reservists attending refresher training exercises will be increased by around 1,200 next year.
 According to Finnish Defence Forces Commander  Timo Kivinen , more than 19,000 reservists will receive refresher training next year. Three times as many reservists are to take part in volunteer activities next year: 12,000, compared to this year's 4,000.
 Kaikkonen said that the increase in the number of exercises is not very substantial, but the government plans to keep increasing exercises in the coming years as well.
 "There is a clear need and demand for it," Kaikkonen told reporters after his speech.
 The government plans to increase the number of refresher training exercises gradually during its four-year term. The goal is to raise the current level by 20 percent by the end of the term. The government programme has provided 1.5 million euros in permanent additional funding to increase refresher training exercises by this amount by 2023.

Military to increase exercises for reservists


Summary: The Finnish arm of failed tour operator Thomas Cook has announced it will re-start charter flights on Tuesday.

Matkatoimistot ja muu matkailua palveleva toiminta

Travel agent Tjäreborg announced on Monday that it would re-start flights and holidays from Tuesday, after cancelling departures on Monday in the wake of parent company Thomas Cook’s collapse.
 The firm says holidaymakers with departures on Tuesday should head to the airport as normal, and if there are any changes to the timetable passengers will be notified by text message.
 Tjäreborg is part of Thomas Cook’s Nordic operations along with Ving, Spies, Globetrotter and Thomas Cook Airlines Scandinavia.
 A board meeting of the Nordic group on Monday decided to continue operations.
 “Since we are an independent and profitable part of the business, we are already able to continue our operations with support from our banks, lenders and guarantors,” said  Magnus Wikner , CEO of the Nordic concern.
 On Monday  holidaymakers were left stranded at Helsinki-Vantaa Airport  after Thomas Cook collapsed on Sunday, with 2,900 tourists out of the country also left uncertain when they’d be able to return.

Thomas Cook subsidiary Tjäreborg restarts holiday flights


Summary: Tuesday's newspapers all have more fallout from the Thomas Cook collapse, along with news of executive pay and a look at how long you'll wait if you call the police.

All the papers follow up on Monday's big news about Thomas Cook declaring bankruptcy, with news from worried travelers and a look at the company's economics.
 The announcement late on Monday that the  Finnish subsidiary would restart operations on Tuesday  somewhat changed the tone of the coverage, however.
 Business daily Kauppalehti takes a typically longer-term view in  its editorial , arguing that "the internet did not kill travel agencies" and that Finnish tour firms are still profitable.
 Party poll
 Helsingin Sanomat  publishes  a party poll on Tuesday, showing little change in the numbers after the  Centre Party elected  Katri Kulmuni  as leader.
 The Finns Party remains the leading party in the HS poll, and all changes were well within the margin of error.
 Ghost boss loses 600k
 Several outlets  pick up  an STT story this morning about a 'ghost boss' at oil and engineering company Neste, who picked up his salary for six years after leaving the company.
 The man had served as head of Neste's Estonian operations and then led its Saint Petersburg branch, but left the firm in 2012.
 Nobody told Neste's automatic salary payment system, which transferred his pay each month as usual, even though he was no longer actually working for the firm.
 The man argued that Helsinki District Court had no jurisdiction in the case as he lived in Estonia and Estonian law should apply. If it did, argued his lawyers, the 600,000 debt would have already expired.
 The court disagreed, ruled in favour of Neste and ordered the seizure of assets to the value of 600,000 euros.
 The man now serves on the board of Enterprise Estonia, whose website  says  it is "one of the largest institutions within the national support system for entrepreneurship by providing financial assistance, counselling, cooperation opportunities and training for entrepreneurs, research institutions, the public and non-profit sectors".
 Katainen gifts golden handshake
 Iltalehti's print edition  splashes  on EU Commissioner  Jyrki Katainen’s  240,000 euro separation payment as he leaves to take up a job leading Finland's state-owned innovation fund, Sitra.
 IL reports that Katainen's pay as Sitra boss is to be 18,533 euros per month, so he is unlikely to be caught short as he adjusts to life away from Brussels.
 The EU makes 'transition payments' to departing commissioners for three years, with IL calculating that Katainen's dividends will come to just under 81,000 euros per year.
 He's in no need of the money and told IL that he is not planning to hang on to it.
 "The payments are made regardless of whether or not a person finds work," Katainen told the paper. "Member states decide the size of commissioners' transition payments. I'm considering different options, for example starting a foundation. Among others  Erkki Liikanen  and  Jan Vapaavuori  have given away their transition payments."
 Police waiting times
 Numbers of police officers have been cut in recent years, and the incoming government has set a target of a total of 7,500 officers nationwide by 2022.
 The worry is, of course, that if you call the police you might have to wait a long time to get an answer, and on Tuesday Helsingin Sanomat  sets out  to define just how long that wait might be.
 They gathered data on police callouts in the first half of the year, which were split into three categories: A, B and C.
 Category A calls should be handled immediately without delay. B-category calls should be handled as soon as possible but they can wait until a patrol is available. Calls in the C category are the least urgent tasks including transfer of prisoners and general patrol tasks.
 In Enontekiö, in the far north of Finland, those reporting a crime could face a three-hour delay before the boys and girls in blue turn up.
 There's been a local improvement recently, as a part-time police officer now works in the municipality of Muonio. That's still 200 km from Kilpisjärvi, however, which is still in the same municipality.
 Even in southern Finland there are some places where it could take half an hour for the police to arrive.

Tuesday's papers: Ghost boss gets paid, Katainen doesn't, and a long wait for police in Lapland


Summary: An online election compass shows disparity between views on indigenous Sámi who don't live in Lapland.

The nearly-monthlong Sámi Parliament elections entered their final week on Monday, and on Tuesday national broadcaster Yle published the candidates' responses to  an online election compass . Possible responses to the 20 questions ranged from "strongly agree" to "strongly disagree".
 Replies to the questionnaire showed a wide disparity of viewpoints on two issues central to the livelihood and prerogatives of Europe's only indigenous group: the rights of Sámi individuals who have moved away from their native homeland in the northern Lapland region (called  Sápmi ) and the Sámi Parliament's efforts to direct funding towards improving the lives of Sámi people in urban centres.
 Candidates were torn on the question of whether Sámi who have moved away from Finnish Lapland should have the same rights to the region's land and waterways; 41 percent said Sámi living elsewhere should definitely be allowed access, while 41 percent said that fishing and hunting rights should be restricted to members of the indigenous group who actually live and work in Sápmi.
 Views on the Sámi Parliament's political involvement in city life also fell into two camps. Thirty-nine percent of respondents said that more should be done to educate and support Sámi living in cities, while 42 percent disagreed.
 Finland's Sámi Parliament elections are organised every four years. This year the elections take place on 2-30 September. The outcome of the vote will be announced on 2 October.
 Finland's previous government under PM  Juha Sipilä   withdrew draft legislation to ratify ILO Convention 169  on indigenous rights in early 2019. Debate over whether Sámi indigenous rights should be officially recognised has dragged on for 30 years.  The government announced in 2017  that the treaty must be ratified "to comply with the Constitution and international law".
 Connection with culture
 Two of the 32 Sámi Parliament respondents,  Janne Hirvasvuopio  from Espoo and  Tauno Ljetoff  from Inari, said in the Yle compass that they are strongly in favour of including relocated Sámi among those with inviolable, traditional rights to the region.
 Both candidates said that Sámi outside of Sápmi must be allowed to exercise their ancient culture.
 "We have to consider how people who have moved away – temporarily or permanently – can maintain their own culture," said Hirvasvuopio. "The Sámi Parliament should also make efforts to increase the attractiveness of moving back."
 Eleven other candidates agreed somewhat that Sámi who live elsewhere should be allowed to make use of their traditional region, with certain restrictions.
 "Only for fishing and hunting," said Utsjoki candidate  Veikko Porsanger .
 "The rights should be based on the traditions of individual families," said  Anni Koivisto  from Utsjoki.
 The idea of family rights rather than universal rights was also raised by Utsjoki's  Anne Nuorgam .
 Candidates  Tuomas Aslak Juuso  and  Teija Linnanmäki  were in clear opposition to the idea of universal Sámi rights to their traditional region. Both said that any Sámi person who moves back to Sápmi should be granted the same rights as all indigenous locals, but not before.
 "Inherited rights must be upheld, but other than that it's only fair that people living in the Sápmi region be in a stronger position when it comes to land use," said  Sammol Lukkari  from Utsjoki.
 "The various benefits and advantages of local residents are intended to make it possible for people here to make ends meet and raise their families, even though there are very few jobs and the distances between locations are vast,"  Tanja Sanila  from Inari said.
 Indigenous rights in cities
 The Yle questionnaire received 31 responses to the query whether the Sámi Parliament should direct more of its funds and power towards urban growth centres, where more than 60 percent of Finland's Sámi currently reside.
 Hirvasvuopio, Porsanger and Linnanmäki were all strongly in favour of increasing the wellbeing of Sámi who live in cities, out of a total 12 who agreed either a little or a lot.
 "It is a fact that moving away from Sápmi is necessary for employment and education, because we don't have the same opportunities as citizens in Southern Finland do," Linnanmäki said. "During that stage in a person's life, a connection with other Sámi outside of their homeland is necessary. Otherwise our young people will break with our culture and our languages."
 Hirvasvuopio said that most Sámi-related cultural activities outside of the Lapland nexus are currently managed by NGOs and individuals.
 "The Sámi Parliament should seek to set up permanent language education funding to revitalise the Sámi languages," Hirvasvuopio said.
 Candidates such as Inari's Ljetoff said that the Sámi Parliament's duty is to the traditional Sápmi homeland, despite how many Sámi live in cities.
 "With so few resources to go around, funds must be focused on developing the livelihood and languages of the Sámi region proper," said  Leo Aikio .
 Most Sámi Parliament candidates agreed, however, that Sámi people should have access to the Parliament's services, no matter where they live.
 "It is useless to pit Sámi people against each other based on where they live," said M&A consultant and the former head of Yle's Sámi language service  Pirita Näkkäläjärvi . "Finland's Sámi Parliament must work for the betterment of all Sámi, as it gets more resources."
 EDIT 25.9.2019: An earlier version of this story stated that Pirita Näkkäläjärvi was a 'journalist and politician'. We're happy to clarify that Pirita last worked in the media in 2017, and is currently working for PwC.
 EDIT 25.9.2019: Veikko Porsanger is an Utsjoki candidate, not an Enontekiö candidate.

Sámi Parliament torn on local rights, urban influence


Summary: More jobs were on offer in Finland last month, though the employment rate remained about the same.

Finland's August employment rate was up significantly from a year earlier but nearly unchanged from the previous month, the official statistics bureau reported on Tuesday.
 According to Statistics Finland, the employment rate was 73.5 percent, compared to 72.6 percent a year earlier. However the trend of the employment rent was 72.5 percent in August, nearly unchanged from July. The trend of the unemployment rate was the same as the previous month: 6.7 percent. The trend figures are seasonally adjusted.
 There were 32,000 more people aged 15-64 working in August than a year before. The vast majority of this increase, 27,000, were women.
 Meanwhile the employment gap between the sexes continued to narrow, but still remained higher for men. Women's employment rate surged by two percentage points to 72.8 percent, while that for men edged down 0.2 percentage points to 74.2 percent.
 Joblessness only up in Tampere region
 Based on data collected by Statistics Finland and the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment, there were 67,500 new jobs on offer in August at Employment and Economic Development Centres, also known as TE offices. That was 8,500 more than the new jobs that opened in August 2018.
 Altogether TE centres had more than 118,000 jobs available this August, nearly 15,000 more than in the previous late summer period.
 Last month, unemployment decreased year-on-year in all TE districts except Pirkanmaa, which includes Tampere, where it rose by two percent. The biggest improvements were in Häme, South Ostrobothnia, Southwest Finland, North Karelia and Kainuu, which all saw their unemployment rates drop by 8-9 percent.

Women outpace men in job market stats


Summary: The Pellervo think-tank predicts that meat prices will soon rise.

The Pellervo Economic Research institute (PTT) estimated on Tuesday that the price of food would rise by 1.1 percent overall this year, and by 1.4 percent next year.
 But the retail price of meat products will climb, according to the institute, with price tags rising by some four percent. The prices of vegetables and fruit, conversely, are expected to continue falling as the supply of new meatless foods increases.
 The consumption of dairy products is also on a downward trend,  PTT said .
 The institute says that food industry growth is now based on an increase in exports. The overseas demand for dairy products and pork has risen, even while agricultural entrepreneurs lose money on their investments.
 The danger of African swine fever breaking out in China and wiping out half of its 400 million pigs has caused a rise in demand for European pork across Asia, affecting prices.
 PTT reported that the increase in meat prices would be more modest in 2020, when a 1.5 percent rise is expected.
 Plant-based products buck meaty trend
 The overall consumption of meat in Finland was on an upward trend for many decades, but now appears to be abating, said PTT. The institute said pork in Finland has seen a longer dip in demand, to be closely followed by the falling appeal of beef and a levelling off in the consumption of poultry.
 "The increasing popularity of chicken has been a top food trend in recent years. When it tapers off, the effects will be widely felt in the meat industry," PTT wrote.
 Finland's meat consumption trend has been on the rise for decades – from 50 kg per person in 1970 to some 81 kg per person in 2018 – but it has been spurred almost entirely by a high demand for poultry, whose growth trend is now slowing for the first time in years.
 The PTT also found that a reason for the decline in meat-eating can be found in an increased awareness of health and environmental issues. People are eating more vegetables and meat substitutes, leading to more innovations in meatless products, PTT said.

PTT: Meat and dairy consumption declining


Summary: The president says Finland will lead the world by example in emissions reduction.

President  Sauli Niinistö  is to address the opening session of the UN General Assembly on Tuesday evening Finnish time.
 Earlier in the day, he was scheduled to attend a state luncheon hosted by UN Secretary General  António Guterres  and a reception hosted by US President  Donald Trump , whom he will  visit next week at the White House .
 On Wednesday, Niinistö is scheduled to chair a panel discussion at the UN Sustainable Development Summit. The event is intended to weigh progress on the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which was launched four years ago.
 During the UN's opening week, the Finnish president is also meeting with his counterparts from Georgia, Poland and Kazakhstan. Also in New York for meetings this week are four Finnish cabinet ministers, including Foreign Minister  Pekka Haavisto .
 On Tuesday, Niinistö  spoke about the responsibility of finance ministries  in tackling climate change at the UN Climate Action Summit.
 After fiery remarks by Swedish activist  Greta Thunberg , some 60 world leaders stepped up to the UN podium to deliver their messages and promises for the future of climate action.
 Niinistö's message was that only a "comprehensive transformation of our societies" could hope to help the world shift to carbon neutrality.
 Finland aims to be first carbon-negative industrial economy
 "Halfway measures are not enough. We have to align all our policies with effective climate action," Niinistö said.
 At the centre of his speech were the so-called Helsinki Principles, a set of guidelines for concrete action forming the backbone of an international coalition, co-chaired by Finland and Chile, which Niinistö said already has 40 members worldwide.
 "Climate action requires all the tools controlled by finance ministries. Taxation and budgeting, public investment and procurement – when these instruments work in our favour, a carbon-neutral world is possible."
 The president finished his speech with a pledge that Finland would commit completely to its target of becoming the first carbon-negative industrial economy in history.
 "The bar has been set very high. We want to lead by example. For that, setting targets is not sufficient. Achieving them is what matters," said Niinistö.
 Meanwhile in Helsinki on Tuesday, EU agriculture ministers discussed the role of soil carbon sequestration in slowing climate change. At an informal meeting hosted by Minister of Agriculture and Forestry  Jari Leppä , they considered ways to support carbon sequestration through the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP).

After climate summit, Niinistö to address General Assembly


Summary: FIN-FSA has intervened in Afarak's operations in the past, and fined its principal owner.

Finland's Financial Supervisory Authority (FIN-FSA) has fined the Afarak Group nearly 1.5 million euros for violations related to insider trading.
 The 1.45 million euro penalty stems from the company failure to comply in late 2017 with regulations on the disclosure of inside information and drawing up of a list of designated insiders.
 Just before Christmas that year, the firm's share price rose based on inside information about a planned takeover bid, FIN-FSA says.
 The company should then have disclosed this information to the public or assessed whether the situation met the conditions for delayed disclosure of inside information, and should also have set up an official insider list.
 In the early months of 2018, "the company failed to fulfil a number of other obligations under the Market Abuse Regulation and the Securities Market Act," the financial watchdog said in a statement on Tuesday.
 The authority says that the size of the penalty is based on various factors including "the significance of said inside information to investors, the duration of the breach and to the fact that the company’s breaches are likely to have complicated the supervision practised by the FIN-FSA and increased the risk of inside information leaks. Additionally, the company has failed to cooperate with the FIN-FSA in investigating the matter," it adds.
 The firm may still appeal the decision.
 Former CEO fined again in June
 The specialty alloys producer has operations in Germany, Malta, Turkey and South Africa.
 Founded in the village of Ruukki, the Helsinki-based metals firm was known as the Ruukki Group from 1985 to 2013. At that point it changed its name after settling a dispute with Rautaruukki, another metal firm that now markets itself using the name Ruukki. It was established in the nearby town of Raahe.
 Croatian businessman  Danko Končar  is Afarak's former CEO, current COO and principal owner via various other companies. His wife  Jelena Manojlovic  is on the firm's board.
 FIN-FSA has intervened in Afarak's operations in the past, and fined Končar. Most recently, in June, it ordered him to pay accrued supplementary fines of 110 million euros.
 At that point the authority cited "the severity of Končar's misconduct" which it said had "served to undermine confidence in the securities markets".
 Also in June the Regional State Administrative Agency of Southern Finland had ordered a special audit of Afarak’s administration and accounts for various financial periods.
 In 2017, Finland's National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) probed Končar's  suspected links to organised crime .

Croatian millionaire's Afarak Group fined over insider trading


Summary: Several people have been injured in a violent incident at a college in Kuopio, eastern Finland.

Police say that at least nine people have been injured in a violent incident at the Hermanni shopping centre in Kuopio.
 The incident occurred on the premises of the Savo Vocational College. The college also confirmed that a serious incident had occurred on the premises.
 One person has been detained by police, and several people injured in the incident taken to hospital.
 Police have not said what type of weapon was involved in the incident.
 This story is being updated

Several injured in violent incident at Kuopio college


Summary: Climate, berries and men's football are on the agenda in Wednesday’s newspapers.

Climate change is high on this week’s news agenda, and Helsingin Sanomat  has  an interesting poll on Finns' attitudes to climate change.
 As president  Sauli Niinistö  has shown this week in New York, Finland’s global  leadership on climate policy  is strong.
 However on the home front, Finns are split down the middle. According to the HS poll some 46 percent of respondents are willing to compromise on their own living standards to fight climate change.
 On the other hand, some 45 percent believe climate change has been exaggerated and the same figure is unwilling to accept a lower standard of living to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
 The breakdown of respondents by party affiliation also provided interesting data, with most parties showing a similar split on climate policy.
 However the Finns Party was an outlier, with just one percent of their supporters questioned saying they’d compromise on living standards, and just two percent saying Finland should be a trailblazer in climate policy.
 Overall 48 percent of respondents said Finland should lead the way on climate, and that figure rose to 61 percent among the under-30s.
 Some 1,099 people took the online survey in August and September.
 A berry good time
 It’s berry picking season in Finland, and Iltalehti has  a story  from Mikkeli of the country on a campaign to encourage more people to venture into the forests.
 At present some 90 percent of berries that are sold in Finland are picked by seasonal workers from abroad who move to Finland for the picking periods.
 'Berry buddies' are on offer this year to help people who might not know where to look for forest fruits, or might be scared of getting lost or encountering one of the larger mammals known to lurk in Finnish forests.
 The campaign is run by Arctic Flavours, which describes itself as an ‘association for Non-Wood Forest Products specialising in wild berries, mushrooms, herbs and special forest products’.
 Birgitta Paananen , the association’s Managing Director, tells Iltalehti that at the World Berry-picking championships last weekend (yes, really), the winner of the women’s competition picked 16 kilos of lingonberries in an hour.
 That would fetch 56 euros in Mikkeli market square, and thanks to a quirk of the Finnish tax system that income is untouched by the state.
 Paananen suggests that a family might earn enough for a foreign holiday if they worked hard in the forests.
 Intrepid berry pickers can head to the Arctic Flavours  website  for more information in English about the bountiful harvest available in the local woods.
 Helsinki misses out on Super Cup
 Most  papers  report on the Finnish angle from yesterday’s Uefa meeting in Ljubljana. The European football body ruled on hosting rights for upcoming prestige men's games, and Finland missed out on the 2021 Super Cup.
 Instead the Uefa meeting selected Belfast as the host city.
 The Finnish FA had wanted to host the match at the revamped Olympic Stadium, which is scheduled to reopen next year.
 The Super Cup is a curtain-raiser played at the start of each football season, and in recent years it has been hosted by some of the continent’s lesser-known footballing destinations: Trondheim, Tbilisi, Tallinn and Skopje.
 There was one silver lining, however: the 2021 men's Champions League final will be played in Saint Petersburg, just three hours from Helsinki. Helsingin Sanomat  notes  that this location is closer than any previous final stadium.

Wednesday’s papers: Climate divide, berry picking championship and football disappointment


Summary: Only a quarter of Finns over 30 have healthy weights.

Finnish residents are having a difficult time squeezing into the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) global goal for halting the rise in diabetes and obesity by the year 2025.
 The Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (THL) on Wednesday said Finnish residents were going to have to make substantial lifestyle changes to get healthy.
 The THL has identified working age people as one group whose waists are expanding at an alarming rate. The health watchdog points to the results of the FinHealth 2017 Survey, which found that just a quarter of people over the age of 30 in Finland have a healthy weight.
 The WHO classifies individuals as overweight and obese based on body mass index (BMI), which is determined by dividing a person's weight by the square of his or her height. It considers any adult with a BMI of 25 or more to be overweight, while those with 30 or more are obese.
 The FinHealth Survey found that nearly three-quarters of men and two-thirds of women over the age of 30 were at least overweight, whereas 26 percent of men and 28 percent of women were obese. This means that every other Finnish adult stores too much abdominal fat, which health experts say is the most dangerous type of excess fat to carry as it envelopes inner organs and may trigger a host of other conditions.
 Children in Finland are also too chubby, according to the THL, as almost a quarter of  children and adolescents  carry too much weight.
 More carrots and stick
 “We need politicians to make decisions to help solve the problem, such as using tax policy to guide people towards healthier choices and urban planning that promotes physical activity,” said  Annamari Lundqvist , a specialist with the THL. “Public health services also need to support people's weight loss.”
 The number of people in Finland living with type 2 diabetes, partly triggered by being too heavy and inactive, is growing, mainly due to the ageing population, earlier diabetes detection and longer lifespans of people living with the disease.
 The WHO reports that in the past three decades the prevalence of type 2 diabetes has risen dramatically around the world.
 "Being obese increases your chances of developing type 2 diabetes by a factor of eight, compared to someone of normal weight," explained  Jaana Lindström  of the THL.

THL: 75% of working age Finns overweight


Summary: Finland hit the headlines earlier this year when the incoming government announced a target of zero net carbon emissions by the year 2035.

Finland’s international profile as a climate change trailblazer has been enhanced this year by ambitious targets set by the government and a heartfelt speech by President  Sauli Niinistö  at the United Nations General Assembly.
 “Even if we were able to stop all of our CO2 emissions tomorrow, we would have to live, for decades to come, with the climate change we have already caused,” Niinistö told the assembled world leaders.
 “We are no longer able to avoid the climate crisis completely. We also have to achieve concrete results in adapting to the inevitable.”
 Those concrete results are yet to be seen. The government’s budget for 2020 included higher taxes on petrol and some additional funding for environmental measures, but also continued to fund subsidies for carbon-intensive peat burning.
 Finnish President Sauli Niinistö had a stark message for world leaders in New York.  Don Emmert / AFP
 In total some 3.5 billion euros of subsidies harmful to the environment were identified by the government’s  own budget proposal .
 The budget got a cool reception from Markku Ollikainen, the chair of Finland’s climate panel, a body of experts set up to provide the government with recommendations on climate policy.
 “I would have expected subsidies for peat burning to be axed, because that would have the biggest impact,” said Ollikainen. “The second thing I would have expected would be logging. A charge for clearing forest would reduce emissions from land use really quickly.”
 The strongest voice this week has undoubtedly been that of Greta Thunberg, the teenage Swedish activist who chided world leaders at a climate summit on Monday.
 The global climate strike movement she helps to lead has been an outlet for young people’s anger and despair, with strikes hitting all corners of the globe.
 Finland’s latest climate strike hits on Friday 27 September, with schoolchildren and students set to leave their classrooms and take to the streets to demand quicker action on carbon emissions.
 Be the (climate) change you want to see?
 “We know we are not doing enough,” says Pursiainen. “Everybody knows it. People think that somebody else somewhere will do something to solve this, but we are running out of time for those solutions,” says climate activist  Riina Pursiainen .
 Pursiainen serves as vice-chair of the Finnish chapter of Youth Agenda 2030, a body established for young people to advocate for the UN’s 2030 sustainable development goals in the Finnish context.
 Story continues after photo
 Riina Pursiainen, vice-chair of of the Finnish chapter of Youth Agenda 2030. Riina Pursiainen
 “We can’t stop the climate from changing but we can stop the worst of the effects of climate change and we can learn better how to live in the age of climate change,” explained Pursiainen, who is clear that ‘we are not doing enough’.
 “I do think that if we don’t do anything it will just be impossible for us to live with ourselves in 30 years’ time. So I think we have to do everything we can.”
 Ozone layer action
 Pursiainen draws the comparison between CFCs in fridges, which were found to damage the ozone layer and subsequently banned in consumer products.
 “We didn’t say that consumers have a choice of buying a more expensive fridge that doesn’t have these chemicals, or they could buy the same kind of fridge that is cheaper but has this chemical that destroys the ozone layer,” says Pursiainen.
 “It didn’t happen like that, there was direct action from an international level. We said that we were not going to produce those refrigerators any more. It was not a consumer choice.”
 Amanda Rejström , founder of social enterprise Spark Sustainability, agrees that the new government’s budget falls far short of what’s needed to fight the problem.
 “No, I don’t think it’s enough at all. I don't think the target of carbon neutrality by 2035 is reflected in the budget, we need to do much more. However I'm really happy that we have a government setting this target,” says Rejström.
 Story continues after photo
 Johanna Vinberg / Yle
 Her outfit’s goal is to coax people to change behaviour, because lifestyles are very likely to be different as the world moves to a lower-carbon future.
 She says the juxtaposition between personal responsibility and government policy is a ‘stupid discussion’.
 “All of these political decisions that we’re waiting for will happen, they are inevitable, so we want to prepare people for them,” says Rejström. “The lifestyle changes that support carbon neutrality by 2035 are possible and, contrary to popular belief, they can increase happiness.”
 “We want to gently wake people up and lead them to the low-hanging fruit in their own carbon footprint. There are a lot of voices being very critical, but we want to be positive and not make people feel guilty.”
 What do you think of Finland’s moves to fight climate change? Could we do more? Would you be willing to make personal sacrifices for the environment? Amanda Rejström and Riina Pursiainen join us for this week’s All Points North podcast on Thursday. You can send comments or questions via WhatsApp on +358 44 421 0909, on our Facebook or Twitter accounts, or at yle.news@yle.fi.

Finland wants to be carbon neutral by 2035. But how will it get there?


Summary: Architects of the programme say the skateboarding curriculum will give students many real-life skills.

Finland is getting closer to rolling out its first  skateboarding high school  in Tampere.
 From the fall of 2021, Tampere’s Sampo central upper secondary school will offer 20 students spots in its skateboarding programme, which also incorporates a communications focus. Sampo high school is a specialised high school offering programmes in sports and communications.
 “Skateboarding involves a lot more than rolling on a board – it’s about event production and marketing, networking, filming and managing social media,” explains  Teemu Grönlund , a science teacher who also chairs local skateboarding association Kaarikoirat.
 Grönlund pointed out that urban skateboarding has faced a long road to becoming socially acceptable, or mainstream, in Finland. One watershed moment in the sport was being  added to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics . American skateboarding star  Lizzie Armanto , a dual Finnish citizen, is  joining  Finland's OIympic skateboarding team.
 “Students can gain a career as well as a high school diploma if they learn content and event production while building a network in Finland as well as abroad,” Grönlund added.
 Jorma Suonio , director of upper secondary education in Tampere, said the skateboarding programme was a way for the city to offer students an education that’s not only modern but also offers teens a space to make use of their skills and interests. However, repurposing parts of Sampo central upper secondary school for skating carries a 1.1 million euro bill, according to Suonio.
 Tampere's skateboarding school is not a world first, however. The city's educators have conducted several field trips to Bryggeriet, a skateboarding high school in Malmö, Sweden for inspiration.

Finland’s first skateboarding high school to open in 2021


Summary: A number of swimming pools in Finland are introducing shifts or courses geared towards immigrants, especially women.

Several public as well as private swimming pools in Finland are taking measures to encourage immigrants, particularly women, to learn how to swim.
 The Finnish Swimming Teaching and Lifesaving Federation, an organisation dedicated to improving swimming skills and reducing drowning deaths in Finland, has launched a course aimed at cultivating swimming skills and knowledge among immigrants.
 It will be organised by the Raseko Raisio Regional Education and Training Consortium, a partner company of the federation, in Raisio, southwest Finland. The course is part of the  "swimming skills for all" project  (in Finnish) that has been funded by the Finnish National Agency for Education.
 Sheida Mohammadi , who moved to Finland from Iraq four years ago, goes for a swim once a week with her child and plans to join the course.
 "I have only been in the water with my child. Not being able to swim properly is a problem. I like the water, and can visit the pool in my burkini. In the future, I plan to swim more often and for longer distances once I learn how," she said.
 Instruction in native language
 The swimming course has received an enthusiastic response from users. "Our goal is to have immigrant background instructors who can teach courses in their own language within a few years," Chairman of the Board of the Finnish Swimming Teaching and Lifesaving Federation  Jukka Rantala  explained.
 Story continues after photo.
 Outi Penkkala said she has seen the joy exercise can bring to those not used to it. Minna Rosvall / Yle
 "Initially we had doubts about whether we would get enough students for a full batch, but the reception was great and we got a lot of people,"  Outi Penkkala , a teacher at Raseko, said.
 There has been much discussion about the use of different kinds of swimwear in Finnish swimming pools. Mohammadi said that she has not received any negative backlash or comments about the burkini she wears when she goes swimming at the pool or the beach.
 Gulbahar Afghan  and  Mahziwar Ahmadi , whoboth moved to Finland from Afghanistan, never had the chance to swim in their home country. "Swimming at the same time as men is not possible. It is forbidden in our culture," Afghan explained.
 Afghan and Ahmadi will be able to participate in the swimming course in Raisio, as there are separate courses for men and women.
 Story continues after photo.
 Gulbahar Afghan and Mahziwar Ahmadi watched as Sheida Mohammadi (center) swam in a burkini. Minna Rosvall / Yle
 "We are a bit scared of the water, but we want to learn how to swim. We are slightly nervous about the course. Swimming is good exercise, that’s why we want to learn," they said.
 Enthusiastic response
 Dozens of women swim during the women-only shift every week at the Petrelius swimming pool in Turku. Sometimes there are so many swimmers that not everyone gets a chance to use the pool.
 "The women enjoy the pool from start to finish time,"  Christina Nokkola , who organises women-only shifts at the ÅSK swimming club in Turku, said.
 The privately-owned Turun Uimahalli (Turku swimming pool) also offers separate swimming days for women and men. The pool allows any swimwear made of swimsuit fabric, including those with long sleeves and leggings like burkinis.
 Public swimming pools in Turku also permit women to swim in burkinis. Not all swimming pools in Finland allow this kind of swimwear. That said, the non-discrimination ombudsman has recommended that all public swimming pools in Finland should  permit the use of burkinis .

More Finnish swimming pools offering women-only hours


Summary: Climate activists blocked the MS Queen Elizabeth in Helsinki on Wednesday evening as it tried to leave for Russia.

Cruise ship visitors were delayed in Helsinki on Wednesday evening after climate activists blocked the MS Queen Elizabeth at Hernesaari port in Helsinki.
 Activists from the Elokapina group, which is part of the international Extinction Rebellion group, delayed the Cunard liner by around an hour.
 It had been scheduled to leave for Saint Petersburg at 5pm, but activists in kayaks paddled to the front of the ship, forcing it to wait.
 “We want to draw attention to the environmental and climate crisis,” said Elokapina member  Elina Kauppi .
 Helsinki police detained one person at the scene of the protest.
 Elokapina has been operating in Finland since 2018. They are committed to non-violent actions which cause disruption but draw attention to activities that they believe destabilise the climate.
 _On Thursday the Yle News podcast All Points North  looks at  action to stop climate change. If you have a comment or question get in touch via WhatsApp on +358 44 421 0909, on our Facebook or Twitter accounts, or at yle.news@yle.fi._

Climate activists block cruise ship in Helsinki


Summary: Porvoo shooting developments, global economic uncertainty hits Finland, and a curious case of institutional racism.

Investigators say the two brothers implicated in last month’s  Porvoo shooting incident , in which two police officers were shot while responding to a routine call, acted alone, reports newsstand tabloid  Iltalehti .
 IL said it had not found any evidence that the brothers were acting on behalf of a third party, citing detective chief inspector  Kimmo Huhta-aho , who said there was strong evidence indicating that the brothers acted independently.
 The National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) said initial blood test results did not show the pair being under the influence of drugs or alcohol to the extent that it would have impaired their decision making.
 Layoff season
 Power systems company  Wärtsilä  is looking to slash 200 jobs in Finland, reports business daily  Kauppalehti , as the firm continues to reduce payroll across all of its business segments globally.
 Wärtsilä Finland’s managing director,  Vesa Riihimäki , told KL the company was responding to the global macroeconomic situation, which has grown increasingly unstable over the past six months.
 Autumn in Finland is the season of union co-determination talks, a legal pre-requisite for lay-offs, in many workplaces. At the moment, Finland's unemployment rate is just above 6 percent, according to national number cruncher  Statistics Finland .
 Listed on the Helsinki Stock Exchange, Wärtsilä employs over 19,000 people in 80 countries. One-fifth of its workforce is based in Finland.
 Institutional racism
 The Institute for the Languages of Finland ( Kotus ) has rejected a proposal by a journalists’ association in northern Karelia to rename its local recreation island.
 The island is currently known as “Neekerisaari”, using a racist term which was in widespread use in Finland until recent years.
 The union chapter wants to change the island's name to “Uutinensaari”, reports Swedish-language daily  Hufvudstadsbladet . But the linguistic watchdog said an offensive name wasn’t reason enough to request a name change.
 "Although times have changed and the word 'neekeri' is now used offensively, place names currently in use cannot be removed from the map because the name is felt to be unpleasant," said the institute.
 HBL reports that Finland’s National Land Survey has the final say on changes to place names, however, it will only accept name change applications supported by Kotus.
 Commenting on racist traditions in Finland, activist and writer  Maryan Abdulkarim  previously told Yle News that it is not unusual for people who do not consider themselves racist to  defend customs  that others see as overtly bigoted.

Thursday's papers: Porvoo shooters, layoffs and a racist island in Karelia


Summary: The father denied the murder charges though admitted to killing his three-year-old child.

Finland’s Supreme Court on Thursday upheld a life sentence handed down by two lower courts to a 38-year-old French citizen for stabbing his child to death in a Porvoo play park in November 2017.
 Finland's highest court rejected  Nicolas Mathieu Cherchel 'sapplication to appeal his life sentence.
 Psychiatric evaluations had found that while Cherchel had mental health problems, he was fully aware of his actions at the time of the crime.
 An appeals court said the premeditated nature of the crime—as well as its cruelty—outweighed any mitigating circumstances, such as mental instability.
 The man, who is a French citizen from the Caribbean, stabbed his daughter in a public park after abducting her when her mother was putting her in the family car. The daughter was taken to hospital by helicopter but succumbed to her injuries.
 The parents were in the midst of a custody battle at the time of their daughter's death, and the mother had sought a restraining order against the father because he had threatened to kill the family.

Supreme Court upholds life sentence for man who stabbed daughter


Summary: The company plans to begin a home delivery trial with electric trucks that will be the first of its kind in the Nordics.

Swedish furniture giant IKEA plans to start testing out emission-free home delivery in Finland, with Tampere set to be the first city for the trial.
 According to IKEA, this will be the first trial of its kind in the Nordics, and the pilot truck that is set to arrive in Finland is of a size never before seen in the region. The company said it will begin testing the DAF/Emoss brand electric truck in the southern city in early October.
 Jessica Lehtinen , corporate responsibility manager of IKEA Finland, said thatthe company is already testing emission-free home delivery in five global cities, including Shangai, China and London, UK.
 IKEA plans to use electric vehicles for home delivery in other parts of Finland as well. It also aims to gradually incorporate renewable diesel in home deliveries in the Greater Helsinki area and Raisio in southwest Finland from this autumn onwards.
 According to the company, renewable diesel achieves approximately 90 percent lower emissions than conventional diesel.

IKEA to start emission-free deliveries in Tampere


Summary: Helsinki's underground tunnel, a thirty year plan in the making, died in the Helsinki city council on Wednesday.

The National Coalition was the only political party in favour of expanding a tunnel below Helsinki's city centre to ease traffic congestion when councillors met to discuss the issue on Wednesday.
 The Helsinki city council decided that it would not support plans to  build an underground tunnel that would run seven kilometers  from Helsinki's Sörnäinen district to the West Harbour.
 The Social Democrats, with 12 seats on the 85-member council, tipped the balance in favour of the nays.
 The SDP said the 1.4-billion-euro price tag was too expensive and that resources should instead be directed towards making Helsinki more walkable and improving public transit.
 “Developing public transport means improving access and lowering fares,” SDP councilor  Eveliina Heinäluoma  said.
 The Greens and Left Alliance have also said they reject the building of the tunnel.
 Proponents for the tunnel project have argued that it would offer an underground route for harbour traffic. To that end, the SDP proposed concentrating harbor traffic in Helsinki’s eastern Vuosaari district.
 “This is a loss for Helsinki residents,” said  Risto Rautava , a Helsinki city council member for the National Coalition Party, who has been a proponent of the tunnel, calling subterranean traffic the way of the future.
 Meanwhile, commenting on the council's decision from New York City, Helsinki Mayor  Jan Vapaavuori  told  Helsingin Sanomat , "In 20-30 years' time when there are fewer work places and services in the city, the traffic's a mess and harbours are struggling, we'll know whom to blame."

City council rejects Helsinki underground tunnel


Summary: In the week Finnish youth take to the streets to demand action, All Points North looks at Finland’s moves to tackle climate change.

Finland aims to be carbon neutral by the year 2035, but what changes does that demand? And what adjustments can you make to your everyday life to help?
 Our guests Riina Pursiainen, vice-chair of the Finnish chapter of Youth Agenda 2030, and Amanda Rejström of social enterprise Spark Sustainability explore the issue in the week school students across the world--and in Finland--are out on the streets protesting against inaction on climate change.
 Join the conversation
 If you have any questions, or would like to share something on your mind, just contact us via WhatsApp on +358 44 421 0909, on our Facebook or Twitter accounts, or at yle.news@yle.fi.
 The All Points North podcast is a weekly look at what's going on in Finland. Subscribe viaiTunes (and leave a review!), listenon Spotify andYle Areena or find it on your favourite podcatching app or via ourRSS feed.
 This week's presenters were  Ronan Browne  and  Egan Richardson.  The show's producer was  Priya Ramachandran D'souza , and this week's sound technician was  Joonatan Kotila .

All Points North #61: Talk is cheap - is Finland doing enough to fight climate change?


Summary: Research shows a correlation between education level and mortality from cancer.

Cancer mortality rates are greatest among those who only completed basic schooling, according to new research from the Finnish Cancer Registry.
 The reduction of death rates from cancer has also ended among less well-educated people, in contrast to developments among those with higher degrees.
 The Cancer Registry examined differences in the prevalence of cancer and in death rates from cancer among different demographics, finding that most of the differences in cancer care correlating with location or social status were not attributable to lifestyle choices.
 “The central way to improve equality in healthcare is to improve basic healthcare services and in that way ensure people receive treatment earlier,” said Juha Heino of the Cancer Society of Finland in a statement.
 The research found, however, that differences in care were small and cancer care in Finland is of a high standard.
 Some 40 percent of cancers are linked to lifestyle choices, according to the research, and unhealthy lifestyles are generally more common among socially disadvantaged groups.
 “In reducing the risk of cancer we need to reduce the threshold for offering lifestyle services, such as help stopping smoking or starting to exercise more,” said Heino.
 Among upper social classes there is a greater prevalence of intestinal cancer and breast cancer, according to the research. Among disadvantaged groups there is a bigger risk of oesophagal, stomach and pancreatic cancer.

Cancer Registry: Cancer more common among those with only basic schooling


Summary: Changes foreseen in the latest IPCC climate report raise a range of threats for Finland's natural environment.

Independent police complaints commission

A special report published this week by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) focused on the dangers posed by melting ice cover, rising sea levels, warming and changing ocean chemistry and the prospect of more extreme coastal weather events.
 Earlier projections  have forecast that climate change will impact Finland by bringing shorter, wetter winters to southern parts of the country. It is possible that the volume of snowfall will not decline, but the accumulation of snow will as it melts without longer periods of sub-zero temperatures.
 Northern regions are warming at a faster pace than other parts of the globe, narrowing the environmental niche occupied by species such as Finland's Saimaa ringed seal and wolverines that  need snow banks for dens  where they birth and raise their young.
 Story continues after photo.
 Without frozen lakes and drifting snow, Finland’s endangered Saimaa ringed seal will face extinction.  Yle
 Warmer temperatures are also expected to lead to the spread of forests across the fells of  Finnish Lapland , crowding out the indigenous plant life that now thrives there. The Arctic fox, an iconic denizen of the fells, has already become a rarity and  other species may well disappear .
 A rise in winter temperatures will also increase the destruction of forests. When the forest floor is not frozen, trees are more likely to be downed by the winds of winter storms. Forests are likely to be confronted by new insect pests, as well, a development already being observed in southern parts of Finland.
 Warmer, less salty seawater
 Changes are also being registered in the Baltic Sea. The University of Turku's research station on the island of Seili the southwestern archipelago has been monitoring the temperature and salinity of waters in the area since 1967.
 Decades of data show transformations in surface waters, the topmost layer usually going down around 20 metres.
 "The salinity of these sea waters has declined half a per mille, while at the same time, the temperature of surface waters has risen by around 1.5 degrees," says Associate Professor  Jari Hänninen  of the Biodiversity Unit of the University of Turku.
 Story continues after photo.
 An automated research station has been monitoring water quality off the coast of the island of Seili since 2006.  Markku Sandell / Yle
 This observation is in line with forecasts of an increase of fresh water runoff into the Baltic Sea, reducing its overall salt content. At the same time, it backs projections of rising temperatures.
 The Baltic climate is influenced by climatic conditions in the North Atlantic and changes happening there.
 "All of the water coming into the Baltic comes from the North Atlantic," points out Hänninen.
 Through evaporation, fresh water makes its way into the Baltic region as clouds. Rain from these clouds drains through river systems into the Baltic Sea.
 Salt water from the North Sea enters the Baltic through the Danish straits, but the flow has diminished because of the higher rate of fresh water runoff from surrounding landmasses.
 Because of mild winters, precipitation in the form of rain and melting snow is flowing into the Baltic Sea faster than in the past, raising the sea level. This in turn prevents the inflow of saltier water from the North Sea which is a largely seasonal phenomenon associated with winter storms.
 Story continues after photo
 Professor Jari Hänninen watches as student Johannes Sahlstedt retrieves a plankton sample. Markku Sandell / Yle
 Under these circumstances, there is no room for saltwater "pulses" to enter the main basin of the Baltic, blocking these oxygen-laden waters from flowing into the depths of the sea. This is a change that began developing in the mid-1980s.
 The depths of the Baltic have suffered from hypoxia -  a lack of an adequate supply of oxygen  - for a long time, and no prospect of an improvement is in sight.
 Overburdened by nutrients
 Not only does the future of the Baltic Sea contain more fresh water, it will also contain higher concentrations of nutrients, bringing more eutrophication, overloading of the sea bottom with organic materials, and an accelerated loss of oxygen.
 This will impact not only the deepest parts of the sea, but also more shallow waters, as well.
 The Baltic Sea is home to a mixture of freshwater and saltwater species. As its salinity declines, saltwater species, such as the Baltic herring are coming under pressure. In contrast, freshwater species are thriving.
 Story continues after photo.
 The average size of Baltic herring has decreased significantly since the 1980s. Monica Forssell / Yle
 Monitoring of plankton and Baltic herring by the University of Turku's Archipelago Research Institute has found changes in the diet of herring in these waters as larger copepods, a kind of crustacean that the fish feed on, have disappeared. As a result, herring in the area have, on average, lost a quarter of their length and up to half of their weight since the 1980s.
 "Baltic herring will surely not disappear from the archipelago, but in future, most of the catch will maybe come from the south of the Baltic where salinity levels are staying higher," explains Hänninen.
 Less ice
 The University of Turku's Seili research station lies just north of the village of Nauvo, a boat trip of around half an hour. Jari Hänninen recalls that during the 1990's it was possible to drive by car there across the ice in the winter.
 Story continues after photo.
 With warming temperatures, there will be less winter ice cover off Finland's coasts. Timo Viitanen / AOP
 In recent years, the sea has frozen over no earlier than in February and thawed in March. During that short time, travel by snowmobile or small ATV has been possible, but the trip can no longer be made by car.
 The lack of ice cover has and will impact the lives of residents and visitors in the archipelago, but it is not expected that sea levels will rise in the Gulf of Bothnia, even as melting glacial ice raises the levels of the earth's oceans.
 The land area of Finland is still springing back from the weight of the glaciers which covered it during the last ice age. So, coastal areas are rising faster than projected sea levels. It's likely to be a different story along the south coast, however, where a study by the Finnish Meteorological Institute says the risk of flooding will grow significantly by the end of the century.

Finland's future: Wet winters, warming Baltic, forested fells


Summary: Friday's newspapers include stories on the increased numbers of convictions in criminal cases, an appeal to reduce meat consumption and news of a new destination for cheap flights.

As climate strikes grip Finland's towns and cities, tabloid Iltalehti  reports  on Friday that sustainability researchers want retailers to stop using discounted meat as a loss leader.
 A letter published on Thursday by the University of Jyväskylä's Food System Studies Research Group argues that Finland's supermarkets need to stop selling discounted meat.
 The letter by the research group delved into the sustainability of the Finnish food system and suggested that special offers on meat should be phased out in Finland, except for products that are about to expire.
 The daily quoted the researchers as saying that discounted food does not promote fairness, as it favours big players at the expense of small entrepreneurs and suggested that ‘the most harmful products’, such as non-EU meat, should be completely removed from the market. They also pointed out that the taxation of fresh vegetables, fruit and lake fish should be reduced.
 "For the Finnish food system to be sustainable and fair, major changes are necessary in all parts of the food system — particularly, the Finnish diet needs to be vegetable-based," according to research fellow  Dr Teea Kortemäki .
 More convicts sentenced
 The number of prison sentences issued in Finland has been shooting up, reports  Helsingin Sanomat , publishing the latest figures from  Statistics Finland .
 In 2018, 4.4 per cent more convictions were issued than a year earlier, ending a long-standing downward trend in the number of imprisonments since 2004.
 A total of 5,566 cases of unconditional imprisonment were passed last year, bringing the numbers up from 5,255 the previous year and 12,692 conditional imprisonments were carried out, nearly 500 more than in 2017, reported the daily.
 “There seems to be an increase in almost all types of punishment, so the difference rather reflects the change in the number of convicted cases,”  Tapio Lappi-Seppälä , professor of criminal law and criminology at the University of Helsinki, told HS.
 Last year, 11 people were sentenced to life imprisonment, while a total of 71 were sentenced to imprisonment for eight years or more. More than half of these were on charges of manslaughter, murder, death or infanticide and 44% from drug offenses.
 The number of imprisonments have reportedly increased in mainly two crime groups — drug and traffic offenses, and in some cases — 'drunken, drug-induced driving', according to Lappi-Seppälä.
 Cheap flights to Vienna
 Even as the burning climate change debate has led to a trend of  flight shaming  frequent fliers, low-cost airline Lauda announced its plans to set up shop in Finland and start a brand new daily route from Helsinki to Vienna, reports  Ilta-Sanomat.
 IS reported that the Ryan Air-owned airline named after late Formula 1 legend  Niki Lauda  will start flying in Finland next spring and that the airline will also connectLappeenranta in south-eastern Finland to Vienna.
 Currently, only Finnair operates direct flights between Helsinki and Vienna.

Friday's papers: Rising prison sentences, discounted meat and cheap flights


Summary: According to Lännen Media sources, the organised crime syndicate commissioned assaults on Riihimäki prison guards last summer.

The crime syndicate known as  United Brotherhood  (UB )  is reportedly responsible for commissioning assaults on Finland’s Criminal Sanctions Agency's (Rise) personnel last year, according to several sources contacted by the media group Lännen Media.
 Last summer, six Rise guards at Riihimäki Prison were subjected to  violence , both on- and off-duty. Lännen Media reports that five of the assaults were undertaken by UB, and the organisation is also suspected of being responsible for the sixth.
 Rise's new CEO Arto Kujala told Lännen Media that the agency has taken the necessary steps to protect its staff and that they would continue to compile statistics on all threats and provide information to the police.
 Rise has earlier described the United Brotherhood — a coalition of three previously independent criminal groups — as the most powerful and  feared criminal organisation in Finnish prisons , which employs tactics such as violence, threats, blackmail, invented debts and promises of brotherhood membership.

Lännen Media: United Brotherhood offered a bounty for prison guard beatings


Summary: More than 70% of respondents to an Yle survey said that their livelihood was not at all dependent on forestry.

About 60% of Finns are of the opinion that Finland should not increase forest logging from its current level, according to a survey commissioned by  Yle Luonto.
 Yle commissioned market research company Taloustutkimus to investigate Finns’ relationship with nature by interviewing 1,085 people from across Finland.
 According to the survey, 73 percent of respondents said their livelihood is not in any way dependent on forestry, while 17 percent earned a small sum from forestry, including those who receive secondary income from forest ownership.
 Finland's Natural Resources Institute (Luke) estimates that some 60 percent of Finnish forests are owned privately. Owners can either manager the forest themselves, selling timber when necessary, or hire a company to do so and take the profits that way.
 Five percent of the respondents stated that their livelihoods are significantly dependent on forestry — the group includes forest owners who also have other sources of income.
 Two percent said their own or family's livelihood is directly dependent on forestry — they are either working in the forest industry or as sub-contractors.
 Logging must be hacked further
 Recently, Luke had revisited its benchmark assessment of target  carbon sink levels , after discovering an error in its calculations.  According to the new count,  logging volumes of Finnish forests will have to be reduced by another 1-2 million cubic metres.
 The state-owned research institute's new numbers puts the ceiling at 81-82 million cubic metres for the 2012-2025 period, down from the 83 million estimate proposed last year.
 Luke says the calculation error accounts for the equivalence of 3 million tonnes of CO2, both with and without wood products.

Survey: Finns not keen to increase logging


Summary: While gender inequalities in health services have reduced, there are still significant regional disparities.

A new report by the European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies has found that the fragmented nature of the Finnish healthcare system is adversely affecting the overall quality of its services.
 The report was assembled in collaboration with the National Institute for Health and Welfare (THL) and Tampere University as part of a series of country-specific assessments of healthcare systems across Europe and forms the basis for a broader study of the region.
 According to the authors, Finland's healthcare system is highly decentralised, with healthcare services organised by municipalities with varying levels of resources and funded by multiple sources. This makes it difficult to manage the system and its associated costs.
 Healthcare in Finland is otherwise fairly efficient, according to the study, with users reporting relatively high levels of satisfaction with the quality of services.
 "Healthcare in Finland works well compared to other countries in Europe. The system has undergone significant development in the past few years: primary healthcare has been strengthened and for example the cost of medicines has been reduced," Director of the European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies  Josep Figueras  said in a press release.
 Northern, eastern and central Finland are the worst off
 The report noted that while there has been a decline in gender-based and socioeconomic inequalities in Finland’s healthcare system, they still remain significant. There are also regional disparities in the country, with patients in the northern, eastern and central regions affected the most.
 It was also pointed out that Finland spends less money per capita on healthcare than other countries studied, including the other Nordic countries, the UK and the Netherlands.
 Out-of-pocket payments account for approximately one fifth of total health expenditure, with Finns spending substantial amounts on prescription drugs. Private spending on prescription drugs amounts to one third of all pharmaceutical expenditure in Finland.
 Additionally, in some health centres, patients with non-emergency cases have to wait in a queue for a few weeks to see a doctor. "Waiting lists, patient fees and the fragmentation of the system require attention," Figueras said.
 The report was released on Thursday in conjunction with the ongoing meeting of senior healthcare officials hosted by the Finnish EU presidency in Helsinki. The last report on the Finnish healthcare system was published in 2008.

Report: Fragmentation weakening the Finnish healthcare system


Summary: Up to 40 students will be accepted to study social sciences in Tampere next spring if they ace a free online course.

Finland is increasing the number of university courses it is offering online for free. The added Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) are also being trialled as a new route for university admission.
 The University of Tampere in southern Finland has decided to accept successful completion of an online course and a supplementary interview as sufficient grounds for admission to its social science faculty, starting in the spring of 2020.
 Helsinki University is planning a similar admissions path, whereby prospective students who successfully complete the required online course and a pass a "skills demonstration" would gain admission to the school's Bachelor of Social Sciences programme. It is expected to make a final decision about changing the admissions policy in October.
 The programme expands on  free online courses coordinated by the University of Helsinki's Department of Computer Science , featuring the content of first-year courses on artificial intelligence and programming basics. Unveiled in 2018, the  MOOC content  drew  over 140,000 participants , and provided those who completed the online courses with the possibility to continue their studies. Helsinki's Aalto University and the Universities of Jyväskylä, Oulu and Turku have also taken part in the pilot, which extended to courses in mathematics and statistics as well.
 The University of Eastern Finland, with campuses in the eastern cities of Joensuu and Kuopio, has also made its first Finnish-language law courses available online.
 Limited admission in first year
 The planned MOOC content will work the same way in both Tampere and Helsinki. An online course would be made available for free at the same time that the spring application period begins. Interested students can study the material at their own pace for two to three weeks, and then complete the course in April, after the upper secondary school matriculation exams come to a close.
 The course would be worth five study credits and only those students gaining a grade of 4 or more on a scale of 0-5 would be considered for admission.
 Degree programme manager  Marko Salonen  of the Tampere University's Social Science faculty says that a maximum of 40 new students will be admitted to study via the MOOC, while 50 more will be accepted on the basis of their matriculation exam results.
 "Those applicants who are asked to come in for the interview can pretty much rest assured that they will be accepted. […] If a student can't pass the interview, we can deduce they have probably cheated on the online course," he says.
 Mikko Vanhanen  of Helsinki University says that if Helsinki goes ahead with the programme, it will chose 29 new social sciences students via MOOC and 30 more first-year students on the basis of their matriculation exam results.
 Tampere University's Salonen says that he expects about a thousand people to show interest in the MOOC admissions option. The pilot is part of an education ministry  Alternative path to university  initiative in Finland to make  higher education more accessible .
 A recent OECD report determined that the  ratio of highly-educated people  in Finland aged 25 to 34 remains below the average among similar groups in EU and OECD countries.

New pathway to admission: Finnish universities expand free online course selection


Summary: Maria Ohisalo says Finland should also rethink the deportation of asylum seekers who have integrated and found work.

Ministerit, ministeriöt ja valtioneuvosto

Minister of the Interior  Maria Ohisalo  wants to improve asylum application processing in Finland, especially in its early stages, to avoid problems in the process and wait times that can stretch to several years.
 Appearing in an interview on Yle's Ykkösaamu programme, the Green Party chair said that Finland should consider granting residence permits to people who have integrated and found work.
 The minister said that the beginning of the asylum application process in particular should be improved, to avoid  long waiting times  and streamline the immigration authorities' work . She reported that the government has earmarked 26 million euros over the next two years to improve the Finnish Immigration Service's processing of asylum applications.
 Ohisalo called for immigration officials to be more mindful of asylum seekers' legal rights, and ensure the availability of interpreters and legal advisers. She also hinted at the possibility of longer  appeal periods  being reinstated.
 "Right now, at start of the process, speed has taken priority over quality," she said in her morning interview, vowing to make quality the priority once again.
 The government has recommended in its official four-year agenda that asylum seekers who have secured a steady job in Finland should be granted a residence permit. Minister Ohisalo said on Saturday that Finland should rethink whether it wants to be deporting people who have integrated and found work.
 Finland's interior minister said that current Finnish law already sees to it that asylum seekers who are convicted of serious crimes are deported. A citizens' initiative backing the deportation of foreigners convicted of sexual offences recently gained enough signatures to be considered by the Finnish Parliament.
 Iraq and Syrian camps are sticking points
 Iraq refuses to repatriate rejected asylum seekers  who are forcibly returned to the country from Finland and most other European countries. Finland has been negotiating with Iraq to allow for the deportations, but Ohisalo said that a deal is unlikely to take place anytime soon. She says most of Europe is confronting the same challenge.
 Ohisalo reminded viewers of the morning talk show that European asylum policy has been jammed for years, and hundreds of people have drowned this year in the Mediterranean. She said it is Finland's task in its role of rotating EU presidency to promote long-term solutions and temporary mechanisms. She gives as an example the project to create a group of "willing countries" to distribute refugees and migrants rescued at sea, and said that Finland's government is currently in talks to determine how many countries should be involved before Finland commits to the effort.
 On the issue of Finnish nationals at the  al-Hol refugee camp in Syria , the interior minister said that from the ministry's point of view, every Finnish citizen has the right to return to their home country if they arrive at the border. She said that in other cases, it is a matter for the Ministry for Foreign Affairs to deal with. She says the government is considering how to help the  children in the camp , who have been unable to choose their situation in life.

Interior minister vows to improve asylum application processing


Summary: The MS Estonia ferry sank in international waters close to Finland on 28 September 1994, claiming more than 800 lives.

On this date 25 years ago, the passenger ferry MS Estonia went down in international waters off the island of Utö in the Turku archipelago, killing 852 passengers and crew. Ten Finns were lost in the shipwreck; most of the victims of the 1994 tragedy were Swedes and Estonians.
 The boat was on route from Tallinn to Stockholm when heavy waves caused the locks on the bow door to fail, flooding the car deck. Most of the people on board died when the boat sank below the water.
 A small health centre in the southern municipality of Hanko, Finland cared for some of the passengers that beat the odds and survived the tragedy.  Susann Blomqvist-Söderling  remembers that she had just become a licensed nurse and started work at the Hanko clinic when she was woken by a phone call at 7am, asking her to report to work.
 "It was a stormy morning and I was told that a ship had gone down in the Baltic Sea. Many people had drowned, but some of the people that had survived would be arriving at the health centre for treatment," she said.
 She said the first of the 34 patients transported by Finnish Coast Guard helicopters to Hanko arrived within minutes, and so the staff of the health centre had very little time to prepare. Those that were severely injured were transported to hospitals in Ekenäs and Helsinki, leaving fewer than 20 in Hanko.
 Blomqvist-Söderling says that the patients she cared for had hypothermia and were in shock.
 "During the day they began to communicate more, and with time they were talking quite a lot, mostly about the accident of course. They even became angry when they realized the scale of what had happened. When it dawned on them how few of them had survived, it was devastating," she recalls.
 News of the disaster spread slowly
 There was no such thing as the internet or smartphones back in 1994, so news of the tragedy travelled relatively slowly.
 "The TV was showing footage, but I understood that people following the radio broadcasts had a hard time comprehending the magnitude of the disaster," Blomqvist-Söderling says.
 Swedish-born  Leif Bogren  later wrote a book  Därför överlevde jag Estonia  about his experience. Blomqvist-Söderling says she remembers him well from his time in Hanko, as they went clothes shopping together once he had recovered.
 "Some of the people that were rescued had no clothes on their back. This was back during the recession, so we had strict instructions to only buy the survivors the bare essentials," she says.
 The sinking of the MS Estonia led to a string of improvements in maritime safety in the Baltic and experts say that a similar disaster would nowadays be highly unlikely.
 Memorial services for the victims of the disaster were held on Saturday in Sweden and Estonia.

Finnish nurse remembers Estonia ferry tragedy, 25 years on


Summary: The first flakes of the season fell in northern Lapland on Sunday.

Two centimetres of snow covered northern Lapland on Sunday morning, according to the Finnish Meteorological Institute (FMI), which noted that the end of September was a typical time for the first snow to fall in northern Lapland.
 Meteorologists must record at least one centimeter of snow for the event to classify as first snowfall, said the FMI.
 “The northwestern ‘arm’ of Finland can also expect snow on Sunday,” said  Pyry Poutanen  from the FMI. “A cold air mass is hovering above northern Lapland, causing snow or sleet.”
 Southern parts of the country will have to wait a few more weeks to see the white stuff, which usually arrives by November.

Utsjoki sees first snow


Summary: A quarter of all women giving birth at Naistenklinikka in Töölö move to Meilahti's Scandic Hotel after delivery.

The Family Nest Hotel, Helsinki University Hospital's pilot programme established to ease space constraints at Naistenklinikka Women's Hospital in Töölö, is set to continue.
 Helsinki University Hospital piloted the Family Nest Hotel to meet the demand for postpartum care after Naistenklinikka became the only maternity hospital in Helsinki after Kätilöopisto Maternity Hospital closed two years ago due to  indoor air problems .
 Taxis transport new mums and babies across the road from Naistenklinikka to the hotel, where most mothers stay for a day or two in one of the 20 patient rooms. The Nest Hotel is intended for mothers who had uncomplicated deliveries and whose babies are healthy. At the hotel, families are in charge of newborn care, with midwives only coming by for scheduled appointments. Medical staff is, however, on duty around the clock.
 "Thinking outside the box"
 “Kätilöopisto’s closure gave us an opportunity to think outside the box,” said  Maarit Männistö , head nurse at the Family Nest Hotel. “It’s very quiet here and the sound-proofing is excellent, giving families some peace.”
 At the hotel moms and babies  wear their own clothes and dine at the hotel’s restaurant .
 “It doesn’t feel like staying at a hospital. I think you’d feel more like a patient in a hospital,” explained new dad  Jussi Ukkonen .
 Another new approach by the hospital district has been the introduction of home visits by midwives for families leaving the hotel. According to Männistö, the home visit system means new mothers can be back at home with their babies in as little as six hours after giving birth.
 More family-centric
 However, most of Helsinki’s new residents still spend their first days at Naistenklinikka Women's Hospital, where 9,000 babies are born every year.
 Built in the 1930s, Naistenklinikka unveiled 26 new private family rooms in September, bringing the total to over 50.
 "These days almost everyone requests a family room, and now most can get them," said Naistenklinikka head nurse  Katja Mattila .
 Back at the Nest Hotel, head nurse Männistö, said she hoped the arrangement, initially seen as a temporary solution, would continue as it had been so well-liked by both families and staff.

A quarter of all Helsinki newborns live in a hotel


Summary: Many parliamentarians responding to the poll said they had left or considered leaving politics because of the feedback.

One third of municipal decision-makers and almost half of MPs or their aides have been the target of hate speech due to their work, according to the findings of a new collaborative survey from Open Knowledge Finland, the University of Jyväskylä and Punos Research.
 Two thirds of the lawmakers responding to the poll said they believe that public discourse has triggered more hate speech in recent years.
 “Hate speech can often be prompted by impulsive actions, but it can also be used deliberately to exert political pressure. In these cases, the aim is to silence a certain individual or political view,” says Open University Finland researcher  Aleksi Knuutila .
 Respondents to the survey who had been the target of hate speech said it affected their work significantly. Half of municipal decision-makers said it had reduced their trust in people they did not know, and 42 percent said they were less willing to participate in public debates. Many said that had left or had considered dropping out of politics because of the feedback.
 The first of its kind, the study entitled "Ruled by hate: Hate speech aiming to influence decision-making in society" explored the extent and nature of hate speech and its impact on decision-making. It made use of 14 thematic interviews, interactions on Twitter, and more than 1,300 questionnaires that were returned from the Finnish Parliament.
 For purposes of the study, hate speech was defined as "degrading, threatening or stigmatising expressions that relate to the personal characteristics of the subject or are motivated by intolerance".
 200 accounts responsible for half of hostile Twitter messages
 Many politicians who participated in the study said they felt that their involvement in a particular political party was the reason for the hate speech. The aim of hate speech was not just to influence the party’s decisions, but also to persecute decision-makers for being a member of the certain party, the report on the survey concluded.
 The study identified 200 Twitter accounts that were responsible for about half of the hostile Twitter messages sent to lawmakers in Finland. About 75 percent of the offensive tweets came from people who are against migration.
 The report also linked decision-makers' social media activity with the amount of hostile feedback they received. As a rule, MPs who tweeted more than 500 times during the research period were exposed to significant hate speech. In Finland, party leaders do not tend to be as active on Twitter, but during the 2019 parliamentary elections, each of the chairs received hate speech communications, with the exception of the Blue Reform party's  Sampo Terho  and the Swedish People's Party's  Anna-Maja Henriksson .
 "Men with immigrant backgrounds, like the Social Democratic Party (SDP)'s  Abdirahim Hussein , the Greens'  Ozan Yanar , SDP's  Hussein al-Taee , and the Left Alliance's  Suldaan Said Ahmed  sent far fewer tweets, but nevertheless encountered a lot of harassment," the report reads, adding that the results show that candidates with immigrant backgrounds are easily targeted.
 The survey suggests that the threat of hate speech alone impacts political participation. Even decision-makers who reported no hate speech say that the threat of it has reduced their willingness to participate in public discussions.
 Inadequate measures to address problem
 The survey and the interviews both found that lawmakers consider current measures against hate speech in Finland to be inadequate. Election candidates and members of municipal councils say they are often left without support in the face of such harassment.
 The researchers behind the report propose other measures to clamp down on the problem, beyond legal actions. They make a case for stronger value leadership, whereby decision-makers would condemn hate speech more harshly. They also advise that Finland define the limits for acceptable speech in political activities, and encourage more responsible social media platform monitoring.
 The survey was carried out as part of the implementation of the Government’s plan for the analysis, assessment and research activities in 2018.

Nearly half of MPs, aides report being target of hate speech


Summary: Ten years ago companies in Finland were given the right to snoop on employees' email, but almost nobody did.

A decade ago, Finnish Parliament passed a controversial reform to the data protection law, known as  Lex Nokia , giving employers the right to monitor IP traffic data, such as email recipient details. Employers who had lobbied for the bill said it would help clamp down on industrial espionage.
 The hotly debated reform, dubbed "Lex Nokia" because of the mobile phone giant's perceived advocacy for the law, angered unions and privacy rights advocates.
 Back in the early 2000s, Nokia dug through employee email when it suspected an information leak within the company. Collecting this type of data was illegal at the time, leading corporations to lobby for the bill that was eventually written into law in 2009.
 After the bill passed, Finnish society braced itself for employers to start monitoring employees’ email, with the Data Protection Ombudsman even establishing a three-person team to handle issues arising from Lex Nokia. But reality proved quite different. Three years passed before the office received its first Lex Nokia case.
 Even Nokia, which strongly supported the bill, never reported using it. While Nokia chose not to comment on the matter to Yle, researchers dissecting the company’s history said the law backfired for Nokia as it strengthened a culture of fear within the company.
 Outdated ideas
 Yle found that only six companies in Finland tapped into their legal right to monitor employee email, including startup financier Business Finland and grid operator Fingrid.
 Experts in the field told Yle that technology quickly outpaced the scope of the law. Email now competes with many other messaging channels. In addition, with employers having to notify personnel ahead of any snooping, wily workers were likely to find other means of passing secrets. Companies were also frightened to earn a poor reputation, as Lex Nokia was widely criticised as eroding an individual’s fundamental rights.
 Today, Lex Nokia has become a part of the  Information Society Code , which covers matters like the confidentiality of electronic communications.
 "It's complicated"
 Protecting trade secrets is a more complicated affair than watching email traffic, said  Eija Warma-Lehtinen , an attorney specialising in data protection and privacy.
 “If information critical to a company is stored on an unsecured shared server, it’s difficult to claim that they’re trade secrets,” Warma-Lehtinen explained.
 She told Yle that employees in Finland enjoy a high level of confidentiality in their workplace communications. In comparison to other countries, employers in Finland have very limited rights to monitor personnel communications.

The rise and fall of 'Lex Nokia' in Finland


Summary: Several papers report that most labour shortages are focused in the local public sector and in healthcare.

Kuopio's Savon Sanomat is one of the papers carrying  a report of a survey  indicating that while in general the nation's  labour shortage has stopped growing , it is increasingly concentrated in a few professions.
 Carried out by public employment authorities, the study found that demand is greatest for social workers, pre-school teachers, cleaners, speech therapists, general medical practitioners and various kinds of advanced specialists.
 In contrast, there is an oversupply in the job market of secretarial staff, tailors, graphic designers, data system installers, and IT support personnel.
 Previous surveys over the past few years have highlighted a crying need for more workers in the construction and industrial sectors, including construction supervisors, building site workers, and welders. While there is still a shortage in filling all the jobs in these fields, they no longer top the list.
 Rural residents
 Finland's urban centres are growing at the expense of smaller towns and cities and the countryside. However, most Finns seem to  want to slow down, or reverse this trend .
 Monday's  HS Metro freesheet  carries the results of a Gallup poll commissioned by its parent publication Helsingin Sanomat showing that the vast majority of Finns want to keep rural areas of the country inhabited.
 Nearly 70 percent of respondents agreed that there is a need to keep all parts of the country populated. About of quarter think that it is not necessary.
 Concerning measures aimed at supporting the vitality of communities outside the country's main urban areas, 64 percent were in favour of the state moving more of its administrative units to smaller towns.
 On Monday Statistics Finland publishes its latest population projections.
 Saving food
 Jyväskylä's Keskisuomalainen reports that eight schools in that city are fighting waste  by selling leftover school lunches .
 One school started the practice in 2013 and the programme has expanded annually since then. At present, the schools sell lunches to an average 84 local residents each day.
 Paula Puikkonen , who is responsible for child and youth food services in the city, explains that customers can eat in school cafeterias following the pupils' lunch break, and can also purchase leftover food as carry-out. Leftover school lunches are sold for 1 euro 50 cents.
 According to Puikkonen, last year the city's schools sold approximately 16,000 meals that would otherwise have gone to waste. In addition, school personnel can buy food to take home from all of the city's 35 schools. In 2018, around 20,000 meals were sold to staff that would likely have otherwise been thrown out.
 Puikkonen stresses that the schools are not competing with local restaurants or company lunch services, and that some days, there are no leftover meals to sell.
 In a similar vein, Oulu's  Kaleva  reports the launch of a project aimed at cutting back of wasted food in that city.
 Financed by the local Centre for Economic Development, Transport and the Environment, and organized by the Diaconia University of Applied Sciences, the project will initially map out where and how food in the city goes to waste, and develop logistics models aimed at cutting waste.
 The project is to focus on both climate and social impacts. The latter will mean efforts to provide food aid low income groups. Project Chief  Nina Niemelä  told the paper that there is a need in the city for food aid, and that coordinating the logistics of food supplies that current end up as waste is needed to meet demand.
 It is also thought that in the long run, means to cut back on food waste could also create new jobs.
 It's snowing
 In what is undoubtedly the first of many warnings over the next few months, the Finnish Metrological Institute says that snow and sleet will create hazardous driving conditions in the far north of the country on Monday.
 The tabloid  Ilta-Sanomat  was among the papers reporting that Utsjoki, in the far north of Finland, officially saw its  first snowfall of the winter  on Sunday, with two centimetres on the ground in the morning. To be officially counted as snowfall, the Finnish Metrological Institute requires that no less than one centimetre be measured as of 9 AM at a weather observation station.
 Not only Utsjoki, but also Enontekiö and Inari may be looking at poor driving conditions due to snow and sleet.

Monday's papers: Jobs go begging, saving food, northern snows


Summary: According to Statistics Finland's latest projection the nation's population will start falling in 2031.

Statistics Finland's projection, published on Monday, gives backing to often heard predictions that the country's population will soon go into decline. The agency now says that if the birth rate remains at the current level there will be no region in Finland where births exceed deaths in 15 years.
 Based on current development, Finland’s population will start decreasing in 2031. In 2050, the population would be some 100,000 lower than today.
 In 2018,  the population grew in only four regions  of mainland Finland and in the autonomous Åland Islands.
 According to the projection, the population will grow only in the regions of Uusimaa and Pirkanmaa, and in Åland in 2035. By 2040, the population in mainland Finland is likely to show growth only in the region of Uusimaa, and there  only due to migration gain .
 These projections are based on the assumption that the birth rate will remain steady, with 43,000-45,000 children being born annual during the period of 2020-2040. As recently as 2010 the annual number of births was around 60,000.
 Only a few births
 It looks likely that in future small rural communities may see only a few births a year. One example is the small municipality of Luhanka in central Finland where it is expected that only two babies will be born this year, even though the municipality has offered 10,000 euros to the parents of any child born there. Last year, Luhanka had the highest number of children and elderly people to the number of working-age people with a ratio of 106 to 1. The forecast is that this municipality will register no more than two births in 2040, either.
 The highest rates of fertility are projected for  Helsinki, Tampere and Turku , where more children may be born in 2040 than this year.
 Nationally, the fertility rate is projected at 1.35. Statistics Finland describes this assumption as being "drastic" but reflecting the current birth rate. According to the preliminary statistics, total fertility is estimated at 1.32 to 1.34 in Finland this year.
 The projection assumes that Finland’s annual migration gain from abroad will be 15,000 persons.
 Fewer under-15 year-olds
 This latest set of figures foresees a sharper fall in the number of under-15 year-olds than have past projections. Monday's release sets the number of Finland's population in this age group in 2040 at 688,000, which is 178,000 fewer than estimated in a projection published in 2015.
 The number of the working age population (aged 15 to 64) was at its peak in Finland in 2009, when there were 3.55 million. During 2010 to 2018, the number of working-age people fell by 122,000 individuals. Over the next two decades, the working age population is expected to decrease more slowly, altogether by 111,000 persons by 2040.
 Statistics Finland points out that its projection is intended to provide tools with which decision-makers can assess whether measures need to be taken to try to influence population development.

Finland facing population decline by 2031