Trade Union News from Finland

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ISSN 1458-4433

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The news service is sponsored by SAK, the largest central trade union in Finland, and ten of its 23 affiliated unions.

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FinnWatch monitors operations of Finnish enterprises abroad

Helsinki (04.11.2002 - Juhani Artto) At the end of 2001 almost 4,000 enterprises based in Finland had factories, offices and/or other representation abroad. These enterprises had a total of 749 subsidiaries in foreign countries. How well do they respect core labour standards and other ethical principles overseas?

The information needed to answer this question is not immediately to hand in all respects. This was the starting point for SAK, the largest trade union confederation in Finland, and several other organisations when recently establishing FinnWatch to monitor the foreign units of Finnish enterprises.

"The purpose of FinnWatch is not to defame enterprises, but to make them more conscious of the consequences of their operations," explains Turo Bergman, international affairs secretary of SAK, who continues: "and if problems exist, then FinnWatch will encourage these enterprises to improve their activities."

The FinnWatch project became public last month when its first employee was appointed. The work is financed by SAK and the other organisations represented in the project steering group, and by the Finnish Ministry for Foreign Affairs.

FinnWatch will work closely with the Swedish SwedWatch and the Norwegian NorWatch, both of which have already been working effectively for some time.

Openly defying ILO recommendations: Amer Group continues marketing sporting goods in Burma

Helsinki (04.11.2002 - Juhani Artto) At the end of October the ICFTU publicised an updated list of foreign enterprises trading in Burma. This list seeks to pressure enterprises to discontinue investment and business relations in Burma, as recommended by the International Labour Organisation – ILO.

The list includes one enterprise based in Finland: Amer Group. Amer is on the list because this company has continued marketing sporting goods in Burma. Just before the updated list was published a representative of the company confirmed that despite the ILO recommendation it still prefers to retain a sales representative of its Wilson brand goods in Burma. The argument offered was that the enterprise seeks to offer sporting goods to all people, regardless of homeland, religion or political opinion.

For further details of these Amer Group operations see the Amer Sports website.

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