Employment areas

The responsibility for organising public employment services was transferred from the state’s employment and economic development offices to municipalities and municipal co-management areas on 1 January 2025.  

There are a total of 45 employment areas will be formed. Municipalities or municipal co-management areas informed the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment about their plans to organise the services by the end of October 2023. At the end of 2023, six areas were granted an exemption to organise services with an employment base of fewer than 20,000 people. The Government made a decision on four employment areas in February 2024.

Of the total number of employment areas:

• 39 organise employment services using the host municipality model
• 2 organise employment services using the joint municipal authority model (Employment areas of Suupohja and Kymppi)
• 4 municipalities organise employment services themselves (Lahti, Kouvola, Helsinki, Vantaa)

The Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment must be notified of any change in the parties to or municipalities participating in the employment areas (Section 15 of the Act on the Organisation of Employment Services 380/2023).

Duties of employment authorities in municipalities or municipal co-management areas

The employment authority’s task is to organise as public employment services:

1. employment services;
2. information, guidance and advice services;
3. training;
4. labour market training;
5. transition security training, among other things.

Public employment services also include expert assessments related to the service process of private customers, experiments under the Act (380/2023), self-motivated studies of jobseekers supported by unemployment benefits, and benefits and compensation granted to employers and private customers.

Additional Information:
Jenni Wessman, Senior Specialist, tel. +358 29 504 7034, [email protected]

Employment areas by municipality

You can use the search function below to find out which municipalities belong to which employment area, economic development centre area and wellbeing services county.

The data in the table can also be downloaded from here as an Excel file.