On Thursday April 29, 2010, the Canada-Finland Chamber of Commerce and The Canadian Friends of Finland held a joint evening featuring Pertti Voutilainen.

Mr. Voutilainen is a former CEO of Outokumpu Oyj, former CEO and President of Kansallis Banking Group after its merger with Union Bank of Finland. He is currently an independent director of Agnico-Eagle Mines. He provided an interesting perspective on the differences between practices and culture in both Canada and Finland.

February 23, 2010

CFCC Featured Member: Klingborg Canada by Lauri Asikainen

Lauri shared two business cases: “Big Blast” to save a Finnish mining operation and “Productivity Improvement” process in an US machine shop. The cases demonstrated the vital importance of paying attention to people engagement prior to rushing into trying to implement the action plan.

It is about connecting all the coworkers with the goals.

 The Klingborg Group has 20 years of experience in leadership development. The consultants work with many multinational organizations. While some of the most known client companies include Nokia, Volvo, ABB and Outotec, Klingborg supports business leaders in small and medium size organizations, also.

Besides to seminar style sessions, Lauri uses online tools for training and coaching. One of the most promising new tools is training team/leadership skills through online, multi-player games. The Finnish TeamingStream has developed such a game (Novicraft), made specifically for that purpose. It is a fun serious game. For more information about the game. Please contact Lauri.

 For more on Klingborg visit www.klingborg.com.

Finnish-Canadian Entrepreneur of the Year Award 2008

Tuula Kivinen, President CFCC, Esko Mattila, Industrialist ,Entrepreneur of the Year 2008, Antero Elo, General Manager Osuuspankki, Finnish Credit Union

Key note speaker: Dr. Pirjo Friedman

Esko Mattila

Taken from Vapaa Sana Press Limited The Canada European Union Chamber of Commerce and the Canadian Netherlands Business and Professional Organization arranged a luncheon last week titled Economic Outlook 2007. With the Governer of the Bank of Canada, Mr David Dodge, as the guest speaker the event attracted wide media attention and also gave publicity to the views of the Europe-oriented organizers. In his remarks Governor David Dodge reiterated the Bank of Canada’s outlook for growth in the global and Canadian economies in 2007 and 2008. The Bank projects that the Canadian economy will continue to operate close to its production capacity through to the end of 2008, he said. The risks to the Bank’s outlook are roughly balanced, Governor Dodge noted, but have diminished somewhat in recent months. However, he did point out that the possibility of a disorderly resolution of global imbalances remains. The presence of these global imbalances demonstrates the need for a more effective International Monetary Fund, Governor Dodge said. “The danger posed by global imbalances shows that we still need an international institution charged with supporting the smooth functioning of the global economy.” The Governor stressed that the key to a more effective IMF is to improve the way it conducts surveillance. “As the world’s economies become increasingly globalized, I would argue that now, more than ever, a strengthened IMF is in every country’s interest,” Governor Dodge said.

President of The European Union Canada Chamber of Commerce (EUCOCIT) Christian Frayssignes expressed his appreciation of the call by Mr Dodge for surveillance and management of the global economy imbalances by the IMF. “We can see from his comments on the US slow down (housing and automobile) how critical, with more than 80% of our exports, the United States are to Canadian international trade and investment”, he said. Mr Frayssignes said that the role of the EUCOCIT to promote more Canadian EU exchanges and trade, by offering more visibility to its 18 member countries and 4 associate members should be perceived as an encouragement to broaden the increasingly narrow focus of our international trade. – Any business man knows that the easiest way to get more business is from existing customer, he also knows of the risks, vulnerability and influence coming from relying on a main and large single customer. As Canada starts to broaden its horizons towards the future Asian giants China and India, we believe that we also should expand our trade with the “old European Continent”. Not only for sentimental and cultural reasons, as if many of us came here over several generations to build Canada, with our culture, investments, expertise, … we also keep close links and contacts with our countries of origin, have access to huge trade networks through our organizations and could facilitate access to many areas where EU countries have leading expertise and are “ahead of the game” (environment? sustainability? cleaner energy? engineering? to take a few examples). In 2005, Canada exported $24.7 B to Europe and imported $45.6 B, respectively 5.5% and 11.8% of its world trade. When you look at the respective populations of Europe: more than 500 million for the 27 EU members vs. less than 300 million in the USA we know that we can do better. Mr Frayssignes said. – Cananda Finland Chamber of Commerce is one of the members of EUCOCIT.

The AGM was held at the Toronto Finnish-Canadian Seniors Centre at the B2 level, at 6:30pm. Food & Drinks will be served. We welcomed 3 new board members; Helen Hawkins, Juhani Niinisto & John Vegh.

The CFCC organized a EUCOCIT function at the Delta Chelsea Hotel at 33 Gerrard Street West – -Toronto, ON – M5G 1Z4. The function was from 5:30pm to 7:30pm. Here are some photos taken from the press that came. www.interactivechamber.com/events/january/25/EUCOCIT/index.aspx

The Canada-Finland Chamber of Commerce, Danish Canadian Chamber of Commerce, Innovation Norway and The Swedish-Canadian Chamber of Commerce were pleased to host this very exceptional meeting with Tuomo Laine, Peter Mork, Tor Mühlbradt and Åke Ryhagen, who were appointed this autumn to serve their respective countries as Trade Commissioners to Canada.

As always, this years event was a great success with many surprises along the way. Finnair was again our main sponsor. We also had many other sponsors and we are thankful for everyone’s support.

Next years event will be our 20th Annual and we’re looking forward to seeing you there!

2005 Golf tournament 1

2005 Golf tournament 2

2005 Golf tournament 3

2005 Golf tournament 4