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Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen’s commitment for the Baltic Sea Action Summit

The Baltic Sea Action Summit to be held at Finlandia Hall on 10 February will bring together such public and private sector operators of the Baltic Sea area who are willing to make concrete commitments contributing to the recovery of the Baltic Sea. Almost 140 commitments have already been made.
Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen makes the commitment that all sectors in Finland take intensified measures to improve the state of the Archipelago Sea by the year 2020. Work is to be carried out simultaneously in all sectors in a coordinated manner and with a more ambitious schedule.
Loads to the waters of the Archipelago Sea come from various sources and measures in many different fields are necessary. The Government will place particular focus on the reduction of nutrient loads from agriculture in the catchment area of the Archipelago Sea by optimising the use of fertilisers, increasing the hibernal vegetal coverage of fields, developing special measures for the most sloping fields bordering on water bodies and targeting financial support on agriculture to this area.
Finland strives to become an example region in the recycling of nutrients. Wastewater loads in sparsely populated areas and municipal wastewater nitrogen loads are further reduced. The aim is that phosphate-free detergents are taken into use in the entire Baltic Sea region. In cooperation with other Baltic Sea countries, active effort is made to restrict the discharge of wastewater from vessels into the sea. In addition, an objective is to reduce phosphorus in the sea by fishing underutilised stocks and using fish caught in the Baltic Sea as feed in aquaculture.
Further information:
Esko Hamilo, State Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs, tel. +358 9 1602 2068 and Eeva Kalli, Special Adviser, EU Affairs, tel. +358 44 355 4400, Prime Minister’s Office and on the commitments Nina Hyvärinen, Counsellor, EU Affairs, Prime Minister’s Office, tel. +358 9 1602 4089​

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