European Alcoho... / Resources / Country Profiles / Finland
Finland
In Finland, beer was an everyday food item and almost the sole alcoholic beverage until the latter half of the seventeenth century when distilling spirits from grain became known. Once the practice got under way it spread very quickly, and by the eighteenth century distilled spirits had displaced beer in Finland as the dominant alcoholic beverage. In the nineteenth century, home distilling grew steadily, and drunkenness grew along with it.
At the beginning of the 1950s Finland was a spirits country, and nearly 70 per cent of all alcohol was consumed in the form of distilled spirits. It was only in the first half of the 1990s that the consumption of distilled spirits did clearly decrease, and nowadays distilled spirits account for less than one third of the total alcohol consumption. Now, wine accounts for about 16 per cent of the total alcohol consumption, the same it was in the mid-1950s. Beer consumption had increased in the 1950–1990 period but decreased somewhat in the 1990s.
Because of high alcohol prices and restrictions on alcohol availability, unrecorded alcohol consumption has always played a part in the Finnish alcohol consumption. [1] It has been estimated that in the second half of the 1990s some 20 per cent of the total alcohol consumption came from unrecorded sources. [2]
The unrecorded alcohol consumption in Finland is estimated to be 2.1 litres pure alcohol per capita for population older than 15 years in 2004. [3]
A 2000 national survey of about 1000 respondents aged 18 to 64 years conducted by the European Comparative Alcohol Study (ECAS) project found the rate of abstainers to be 6% among males and 8% among females (based on the most frequent consumed beverage for each respondent). [4]
A national survey conducted in 2000 of a sample representative of the adult population aged 18-64 years found that the percentage of binge drinking occasions among all drinking occasions in the last 12 months was 29% among male drinkers and 17% among female drinkers. Binge drinking was considered to be consuming at least one bottle of wine, 25 centilitres of spirits or four cans of beer. [5]
Youth drinking: According to the 2001/2002 HBSC survey (total sample size =1745), the proportion of 15-year-olds who reported having been drunk two or more times was 53.3% for boys and 55.7% for girls. [6]
The SDR per 100,000 people for chronic liver disease and cirrhosis was 11.53 in 1998 and 10.94 in 1999. The number of alcohol-related road traffic accidents per 100,000 people was 18.76 in 2000 and 18.16 in 2001. [7]
Alcohol Policy in Finland:
In 1932 the Finnish Parliament enacted alcohol legislation that gave the country a new system of alcohol control based on a state alcohol monopoly. This system became the cornerstone of Finnish alcohol control until 1995. Alcoholic beverages were defined as all beverages containing more than 2.8 per cent alcohol by volume. All beverages containing less alcohol were treated as non-alcoholic, and alcohol legislation had no bearing on their production or sale. [8]
There were minor amendments in alcohol legislation between 1969 and 1995. The most important amendments concerned alcohol advertising in the second half of the 1970s and alcohol taxation in the first half of the 1990s. The crucial change took place on January 1, 1995, the day when Finland became a member of the European Union (EU), and when the 1994 Alcohol Act repealed alcohol monopolies on production, import, export, and wholesale, leaving however the monopoly on off-premise retail sale of alcoholic beverages almost intact. [9]
The trend during the last 50 years in Finland has been towards less official alcohol control. There have been periods during this time where control tightened as a result of spikes in alcohol-related problems or incidents, but the Finnish alcohol control system remains a fairly liberal variety.
Alcohol Advertising:
Before 1977, alcohol advertising was regulated by Alko. Between 1977 and 1994, all alcohol advertising was banned by law except in some business magazines. The 1994 Alcohol Act legalised the advertising of alcoholic beverages with alcohol content from 1.2 to 22 percent alcohol by volume. However, the law prohibits the advertising of such beverages if it is aimed at minors, if it depicts alcohol consumption linked to driving a vehicle, or if heavy alcohol consumption is described in positive terms. Also forbidden are advertisements suggesting that alcohol increases functional capacity, makes one socially or sexually more successful, has medical or therapeutic properties, refreshes, or is a means to settle conflicts. [10]
[1] Mäkelä, K. (1979) Unrecorded consumption of alcohol in Finland, 1950-1975, Reports from the Social Research Institute of Alcohol Studies No. 126 (Helsinki, Social Research Institute of Alcohol Studies).
[2] Österberg, E. (2000) Unrecorded alcohol consumption in Finland in the 1990s, Contemporary Drug Problems, 27, 271–299.
[3] Alcohol consumption in Finland in 2004. STTV (National Product Control Agency for Welfare and Health) and STAKES (National Research and Development Centre for Welfare and Health).
[4] & [5] Hemström Ö, Leifman H, Ramstedt M. The ECAS survey on drinking patterns and alcohol-related problems. In: Norström T. ed. Alcohol in Postwar Europe: consumption, drinking patterns, consequences and policy responses in 15 European countries. Stockholm, Almqvist & Wiksell International, 2002.
[6] Currie C et al., eds. Young people's health in context. Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) study: international report from the 2001/2002 survey. Copenhagen, WHO Health Policy for Children and Adolescents (HEPCA), 2004.
[7] European Health For All database. World Health Organisation, Regional Office for Europe.
[8] Österberg, E. (1985) From home distillation to the state alcohol monopoly, Contemporary Drug Problems, 12, 31–51.
[9] Holder, H. D., Kühlhorn, E., Nordlund, S., Österberg, E., Romelsjö, A. & Ugland, T. (1998) European Integration and Nordic Alcohol Policies. Changes in Alcohol Controls and Consequences in Finland, Norway and Sweden, 1980-1997 (Ashgate, Aldershot).
[10] Österberg, E. (1974a) Alkon panimopolitiikka vuosina 1948–1972 (The brewery policy of the State Alcohol Monopoly in the years 1948–1972), Reports from the Social Research Institute of Alcohol Studies No. 79 (Helsinki, Social Research Institute of Alcohol Studies).
