Finland Times

Labour recruitment services and particularly the provision of agency and interim labour continue to increase in Finland, according to a report.

The Labour recruitment services - Sector report on labour recruitment and the SME Barometer on business services was published by the MEE Business Sector Services on 11 November 2016.

The publications provide an extensive and versatile image of the sector, and companies' outlooks and expectations for the future as well as predict changes in the business environment.

“Roughly 95 per cent of the companies that in the official sector classification work in the employment sector, provide agency and interim services. Private labour recruitment accounts for only around five per cent of the entire sector,” says Sector Manager Timo Metsä-Tokila of the Centre for Economic Development, Transport and the Environment for Southwest Finland.

As a whole, the sector is extremely important for our country’s business life, as, for example, there are a total of 1,405 offices in the whole sector and about 1,200 companies.

The sector employs an average of over 35,000 people and the turnover amounts to about EUR 1.6 billion.

As with other business services, labour recruitment, and agency and interim labour providers are strongly concentrated in the province of Uusimaa.

Uusimaa’s share is over a half when calculated by turnover and when counted by employees, about half of the whole sector is also located in Uusimaa. A good 40 per cent of the offices are in Uusimaa, the report shows.

The sector has grown rapidly in recent years, and in fact there is extremely strong competition in the area.

The fact that a significant number of new companies are being set up in the sector all the time, while at the same time some companies are closing down is one sign of the level of the intensity of competition.

Entry into the sector is relatively easy. Almost anyone can set up a labour recruitment company. The sector has also put in a lot of effort into changing perceptions of the sector to be more positive.

“For young people, individual agency work and recruitment have already proved to be effective. For many young people, a labour recruitment company is a route into the labour market,” Metsä-Tokila explains.

The future of the sector, according to the SME Barometer and labour market experts, looks to be positive.