The Finnish economy was showing a fairly steep upward trend in 1994, after a few years of recession. 1994 GDP is put at USD 98 billion, showing 6 percent growth over the previous year. Per capita GDP was USD 19,231.

Today the service sector accounts for some two thirds of GDP and the employed workforce. A very important and fast growing sector is tourism which is clearly winning considerable ground. Approximately one third of GDP is generated by industry, though its share of exports is 85 per cent.

One typical feature of Finland is the number of small and medium sized companies employing less than 500 people. These companies comprise 99 per cent of the total. There are nearly 200,000 such companies in Finland, employing 64 per cent of the workforce and accounting for 60 per cent of total production.