Regions of Finland

Regions Of Finland

Finland consists of 19 regions called maakunta in Finnish and landskap in Swedish. The regions are governed by regional councils, which serve as forums of cooperation for the municipalities of a region. The main tasks of the regions are regional planning and development of enterprise and education. In addition, the public health services are usually organized on the basis of regions. Currently, the only region where a popular election is held for the council is Kainuu. Other regional councils are elected by municipal councils, each municipality sending representatives in proportion to its population.

In addition to inter-municipal cooperation, which is the responsibility of regional councils, each region has a state Employment and Economic Development Centre, which is responsible for the local administration of labour, agriculture, fisheries, forestry and entrepreneurial affairs. The Finnish Defence Forces regional offices are responsible for the regional defence preparations and for the administration of conscription within the region.

Regions represent dialectal, cultural and economic variations better than the former provinces, which were purely administrative divisions of the central government. Historically, regions are divisions of historical provinces of Finland, areas which represent dialects and culture more accurately.

Six Regional State Administrative Agencies were created by the state of Finland in 2010, each of them responsible for one of the regions called alue in Finnish and region in Swedish; in addition, Åland was designated a seventh region. These take over some of the tasks of the earlier Provinces of Finland (the läänis), which were abolished.

Read more about Regions Of Finland:  Regions

Famous quotes containing the words regions of and/or regions:

    What is a television apparatus to man, who has only to shut his eyes to see the most inaccessible regions of the seen and the never seen, who has only to imagine in order to pierce through walls and cause all the planetary Baghdads of his dreams to rise from the dust.
    Salvador Dali (1904–1989)

    Nature seems to have taken a particular Care to disseminate her Blessings among the different Regions of the World, with an Eye to this mutual Intercourse and Traffick among Mankind, that the Natives of the several Parts of the Globe might have a kind of Dependance [sic] upon one another, and be united together by their common Interest.
    Joseph Addison (1672–1719)