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Report Submitted by Finland to the Fourth International Workshop on the CSD Indicators of Sustainable Development
Hosted by the Government of the Czech Republic in Prague
19-21 January 1998

CSD Indicator Testing in Finland 1997

Organization

The Finnish Government has agreed to follow the decisions made in the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development held in Rio in 1992. The Government of Finland established the Finnish National Commission on Sustainable Development in June 1993. The Commission is chaired by the Prime Minister. Other members of the high level Commission represent ministries, central governmental institutions, regional and local authorities, the scientific community, interest organizations, voluntary organizations, the media and the education sector. The work of the Commission aims at promoting the implementation of sustainable development in Finland, in accordance with the decisions made in Rio in 1992.

Finland has also made a commitment to test CSD indicators of sustainable development and the following is a brief description of the testing procedures planned and carried out in Finland. In order to develop and test the indicators of sustainable development successfully, wide co-operation between different organizations is crucial. The National Commission on Sustainable Development set up a network of different ministries and organizations in October 1996 to coordinate the development and testing of indicators.

The following organizations have been included in this network:

  • Ministry of the Environment
  • Ministry of Trade and Industry
  • Ministry of Transport and Communications
  • Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry
  • Ministry of the Interior
  • Ministry of Social Affairs and Health
  • Ministry of the Foreign Affairs
  • Government Institute for Economic Research
  • Statistics Finland
  • Finnish Environment Institute
Twinning

The testing countries have been encouraged to find a twinning partner from the other testing countries. Accordingly, Finland and South Africa have agreed on twinning in the testing process. The nature of twinning has been the exchange of information and expertise. The delegates and experts have met three times.

First contact was made in Ghent 1996 during the third DPCSD indicator workshop. In February, a Finnish delegation visited South Africa to discuss the testing procedures and to familiarize itself with the situation in South Africa. Both countries decided on a similar approach on the testing process.

In September, Finlands twinning partner South Africa sent a delegation to discuss the testing progress in both countries. The indicators were discussed in detail and future plans were made. An indicator seminar was organized which was attended by several people from governmental and non-governmental organizations in Finland. It was decided that both countries will make separate reports in November as well as one joint report that concentrates on twinning experiences. The next twinning meeting has been scheduled to October-November 1998.

Time frame

The CSD indicator testing in Finland was started in January 1997. A special data collection sheet was designed for the testing purpose. The sheets were distributed to specialists who commented on the relevancy of the indicator, comprehensibility of the methodology sheets, the international comparability of the data, and submitted the data (if available). A total of 81 data sheets were completed at the time and few more came in before the final report.

A group of 12 people from different ministries and research institutions (Indicator Network) took part in five workshops, where the data sheets were evaluated. Experts on particular subjects were also invited. The group concentrated on the relevancy of the indicators nationally and globally, as well as on the context of the methodology sheets. By the end of spring 1997, all the indicators were preliminary examined and 57 chosen for testing and reporting. During the summer of 1997, the data was collected to the data collection sheets.

The results were presented to a larger audience during the September seminar. After that, the CSD indicator sheets were filled in for the chosen indicators. Few lacked data and expertise opinion by the time of submitting the final 1997 report, but those will be filled in during 1998.

Criteria for indicators and indicators chosen

Finland is currently reviewing the first Government Programme for sustainable development from 1990. It will be published in 1998. The priority areas include consumption, production and products, sustainable energy economy, community structure and traffic, and country side and the use of renewable resources.

In 1997, all 132 CSD indicators were evaluated. A total of 57 indicators were chosen for further testing and of those 52 will be reported on at the end of 1997. The criteria for selection of indicators were as follows:

  • relevant to assess progress towards sustainable development
  • usefulness to decision-making
  • national targets exist
  • national or in some case international in scope
  • data readily available

Thus, the indicators tested in Finland are those that we feel can be used internationally to measure sustainable development in Finland. This is naturally not the whole set because we have not included drought and education indicators as they were not relevant to us. This is simply our view of what we can report for global studies.

Successes and problems in testing

Overall the testing has been successful in Finland. The formation of the Indicator Network was very useful as it tied several ministries together as well as research institutes. The involvement of Statistics Finland from the beginning was crucial. The fact that testing was well organized from the beginning enabled the testing itself go rather well.

Large part of the data was acquired (for 81 indicators out of 132, and one must realize that many indicators were under development). Although data was acquired for most of the indicators, they were not necessarily chosen for testing. Only 57 indicators were thought to be relevant for Finland in international reporting. All data was acquired free of charge.

The purpose of the testing exercise was not clear from the beginning. We were not sure whether to choose indicators for national purposes (which would have been very few) or to choose them for international comparison.

Finland is currently renewing its Government Programme for Sustainable Development. The new national goals and targets were not available in 1997 and therefore the indicator criteria used for testing were more general.

The CSD IRS came rather late (June 1997) and testing was already well in the way. Finland had developed its own data collection sheet for individual indicators. It was much more concise than CSD IRS and the recent filling of IRS requires some work that could have been done all at once.

Future

In 1998, Finland will concentrate on developing its own National Set of Sustainable Development Indicators. Some of them may be taken from the CSD list, but many new indicators will be introduced as well. The National Set of Sustainable Development Indicators will be chosen strongly according to national goals, targets, and priorities. Finland is currently renewing the first Government Programme for Sustainable Development from 1990. In connection with the Governments programme, the National Commission of Sustainable Development has asked five stakeholders to prepare their own strategies for sustainable development. These groups represent local authorities, industry, commerce, farmers and NGOs. The national set of indicators will be an important tool to assess commitment and progress towards sustainable development.

For more information, please contact:

Ms. Ulla Rosenstrm
Research Scientist, Hydrobiology
Monitoring and Assessment Division
Finnish Environment Institute
P.O. Box 140
FIN-00251 Helsinki, Finland
Tel. no.: (358-9) 40-300-329
Fax no.: (358-9) 40-300-391
E-mail: ulla.rosenstrom@vyh.fi

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