Finland Times

 

The President and Chief Executive Officer country's largest investment and insurance company Ilmarinen, Timo Ritakallio. File Photo – Lehtikuva.

Ilmarinen Chief Executive Officer Timo Ritakallio believes the country’s economic growth forecasts for this year must drop significantly. 

 

Ilmarinen is the country’s largest investment and insurance company.

 

According to Ritakallio, there is a big risk that the recession could continue this year in Finland.

 

The beginning of the year has seen exceptionally turbulent financial markets. According to him, the market unrest is beginning to be reflected in the general economic situation.

 

“This year will be challenging for the global economy. The global economic growth will not grow to three per cent, instead it will stay between two and three per cent. This is a low level, compared to the situation before the financial crisis when the global economic growth had risen to more than four per cent,” Ritakallio told the Finnish news agency STT.

 

According to preliminary statistics, Finnish economic growth was close to zero last year and this year Finland is expecting a slight growth.

 

“It could be that last year was Finland’s [fourth] consecutive year of negative growth. There is a big risk that this will be the fifth. I hope not, but when you look at the current realistic data, it doesn’t look good,” Ritakallio said.