Statistics and research

The Ministry of Employment and the Economy conducts research on tourism, primarily for the Ministry’s planning purposes. Another aim is to produce nationally significant information that benefits tourism industry actors as far as possible. Research on tourism commissioned by the Ministry can be found in the Ministry’s publication series.

The economic impacts of tourism are researched through national and regional tourism accounts. Commissioned by the (former) Ministry of Trade and Industry and the Ministry of Employment and the Economy, public support for tourism and its targeting has been researched in 2000, 2005 and 2011. The Ministry’s Business Sector Services publishes an annual Sector Report on the state and future prospects of the tourism business.

Tourism account

The tourism account measures the financial significance of tourism within Finland’s national economy. The tourism account system is based on internationally agreed standards, making the accounts of various countries comparable with one another.

The Tourism Satellite Account – TSA, approved by the UN Statistical Commission in 2000, comprises ten tables and is based on national accounts data. These tables describe the demand and supply of tourism services and products, the formation of fixed capital, the public consumption of tourism and tourism volumes. The system was developed by the World Tourism Organization UNWTO, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development OECD and the Statistical Office of the European Communities, Eurostat.

In Finland, pilot studies on the tourism account were conducted in 1998 and 1999. As part of the Finnish Tourism Satellite project, implemented in 2004, Statistics Finland created methods for the continuous calculation of tourism accounts. It also provided the final travel account tables for 1995 to 2001, alongside preliminary tables for 2002. The latest statistics are for 2007.