Waqar Naseem Wamiq
“Finland has excellent bilateral relations with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and we will continue on this path. We are constantly looking for new initiatives so that we could further develop our trade relations,” said Minister of Foreign Trade and Development of Finland Lenita Toivakka at a press conference held at the Finnish Embassy in Riyadh.
Toivakka is on a three days visit and leading a high-ranking trade delegation to the Saudi capital. Ambassador of Finland Pekka Voutilainen, Tuomo Ronkko, Jyrki Eklund and Anja Silvennoinen accompanied her at the press conference. Alaa Obeidat was the official translator.
Finnish Ambassador Voutilainen welcomed the distinguished guests and briefed the about the visit of the trade delegation, “The delegation is comprised of three main sectors of Finnish industry i.e. health care, clean tech, and education.” He further stated that the meetings of the trade delegation with their respective authorities were highly productive.
The Finnish trade minister said that “Saudi Arabia is a biggest economy in the Middle East and we have noted the Kingdom’s continuing economic growth and strengths.”
“I personally want to thank my Saudi hosts for the interesting discussions we had during this visit and we are committed to a strong follow up of all the results and ideas coming up during this visit, working with international partners is not about duplicating the Finnish system, it is about co-creating paths to excellence locally,” she said.
Ronkko the spokesperson of Finnish education sector, said that the success of Finland is based on education, for “our educational system is well tuned and efficient.”
“We have very ambitious goals for sustainable energies and one of the areas is nuclear safety, we are planning to invite Saudi peoples to our universities in Finland to study about this subject,” he said.
“We are starting with cooperation in teacher’s training program in order to further grow the local talent. Finland has much to offer in terms of scalable solutions for improving education. Our excellent results from the OECD PISA surveys year after year, in addition to other international comparisons, stand as testimony to unique know-how in the field of education.”
Jyrki Eklund, representing the healthcare group of the delegation, said, “Finnish health care is the state of the art, and knowledge and expertise have enabled Finland to reach a steady position as one of the wealthiest, healthiest, and most prosperous countries in the world.”
“Our comprehensive and high quality healthcare program from primary services to specialized medical care from newborns to the elderly would be very helpful in the Kingdom. Our companies provide such as consultations with top class specialists for international patients travelling to receive care in Finland or effective state of the art cancer treatment,” he added.
We bring together the most distinguished Finnish healthcare and wellbeing services and technology providers. With our highly skilled specialists supported by and a vast array of medical treatments, the variety and quality we provide is truly world class.
Ms. Anja Silvennoinen, spokesperson of the clean tech group, stated that Finland is one of the global forerunners in many clean tech sectors and has been ranked second in the Global Clean Teach Innovation Index.
“Problem solving is in our nature, and Finland has traditions to utilize effectively the latest innovations and processes to solve e.g. energy, water and scarcity of raw materials related problems. High demand is seen in Saudi Arabia in renewables for solar, geothermal and wind energy solutions,” She said.
A reception was given to the visiting trade minister and her delegation by the Finnish Ambassador Pekka Voutilainen and her wife at their residence attended by scores of Saudi dignitaries, diplomatic core, embassy officials, business professionals and others.
