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Finland Minerals
Unavailable
Figure 17. Minerals and Industries, 1985
Source: Based on information from Federal Republic of Germany, Statistisches
Bundesamt, Länderbericht Finnland, 1986, Wiesbaden, 1986, 9.
Finland contained only limited mineral deposits, and it
coninued to be only a modest producer of minerals. The
country's
most important deposits were located at Outokumpu in
eastern
Finland
(see
fig. 17). Discovered in 1910, the Outokumpu
area
contained commercially exploitable deposits of copper,
iron,
sulfur, zinc, cobalt, nickel, gold, and silver. In 1953
prospectors discovered a major source of iron ore at
Otanmaki in
central Finland. Other sites yielded nonmetallic minerals,
including pyrites and apatite (a low-grade phosphoric ore
used
for fertilizer production), and stone for building. The
mineral
industry employed more than 60,000 people, but only 500 of
them
were in mining and quarrying; the others worked in mineral
processing.
The government intervened directly in the mineral
sector.
Under Finnish law, the Ministry of Trade and Industry
controlled
prospecting and mining rights. The ministry's Geological
Survey
dominated prospecting, and it had made most major mineral
discoveries. The ministry controlled most production
through
joint-stock companies, in which the state owned most or
all of
the shares, but in which the management ran the companies
much
like private firms. The industry comprised two large,
statecontrolled companies, the Outokumpu Group and Rautaruukki,
and a
number of smaller, generally private companies. The
Outokumpu
Group, by far the largest producer, operated the Outokumpu
mines,
as well as others producing cadmium, chromite,
ferrochrome,
mercury, pyrite, and zinc. The company also invested in
foreign
mines and produced mining equipment. Rautaruukki
controlled the
Otanmaki iron mine, other mines producing cobalt, quartz,
and
vanadium, and Finland's largest steel plant.
By the mid-1980s, Finland had exploited most of its
limited
mineral deposits and had to work hard to supply its
processing
industries. The Geological Survey had undertaken an
extensive
exploration program to find new resources. Finnish firms
had
purchased interests in mineral operations in other
Scandinavian
countries, and they had participated in joint ventures
with
Soviet enterprises to exploit the rich mineral deposits on
the
Kola Peninsula. The leading companies had also developed
vertically integrated structures, investing in all stages
of
metal production from the design and production of mining
equipment to metal processing. The Outokumpu Group, for
example,
was one of the few firms in the world that controlled all
aspects
of the production of stainless steel. Industry leaders
hoped
that, as mining output fell during the later years of the
twentieth century, overseas investments and vertical
integration
would make it possible to maintain employment despite the
exhaustion of domestic mineral resources.
Data as of December 1988
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