Sustainability footprint
The footprint of operations consists of the negative ecological, social and financial impact of the organisation and its activities on the operating environment. One of the goals of our sustainability activities is to minimise this negative impact.
In accordance with the central government’s guidelines for reporting, we also present information about our personnel in this section.
Responsibility for personnel, procurement and the environment
From the perspective of changes, 2024 was an exceptional year for the personnel, as the Tax Administration held the first co-operation negotiations in its history in autumn 2024. This was due to a decline in certain tasks because of factors such as automation, resizing customer service goals, modifying working methods, and reorganising tasks and the organisation. The change support negotiations concluded with 141 individuals confirmed for dismissal.
Director General Markku Heikura provided background information on both savings needs and the topics of the ongoing strategy round in a three-part podcast series.
Discussions were held with each person whose contract was terminated and coaching on measures to support employment will be offered to them. The aim of these measures and information sessions organised by various operators is to help those dismissed to find concrete future alternatives.
At the end of 2024, we employed 4,767 people in 47 locations all over Finland.
In 2024, the entire Tax Administration had 9.6 days of sick leave per annual work unit (2023: 9.5 days/AWU). The sickness absences were affected by a higher number of accidents occurring during leisure time in the summer, which increased sickness absences during the summer months. Meanwhile, the respiratory virus season at the end of the year was mild, which particularly reduced the number of short-term sick leaves of under 5 days. Despite the support measures, the co-operation negotiations held in the autumn were visible as an increase in psychosocial strain and long mental health-related sickness absences.
In 2024, the working time the personnel spent on training amounted to 6.5 days per annual work unit. The number decreased by almost one fifth from the previous year.
According to the VMBaro job satisfaction survey, the experience of gender equality at the workplace was at a very high level in the Tax Administration (2024: 4.2), although the result decreased slightly from the previous year (2023: 4.3). The result has been developing favourably since 2016 when the score was 3.87. The Tax Administration monitors the gender wage gap using an equal pay index. We are able to achieve good gender wage equality in the same or equally demanding positions. In equally demanding positions, the gender wage gap is small and can be explained by the wage component based on personal performance.
The result of the VMBaro question “Equality is realised in my work community” has been developing favourably over the years (2016: 3.6, 2023: 4.16). However, in 2024, the result declined and was 4.0.
Responsible procurement and facility solutions
We follow the national public procurement strategy in our procurement and comply with its principles. The strategy sets sustainability targets for public procurement, which aim to promote the economic, social and ecological sustainability of procurement. We used the strategy as the basis of preparing our own action plan, which defines the measures that we use to promote responsible procurement.
The economic sustainability of our procurements means, for example, that we contribute to combating the grey economy and promoting tax responsibility in our procurement activities. Before signing a procurement agreement, the Tax Administration verifies that any selected suppliers fulfil their statutory obligations.
Through ecologically sustainable procurement, we want to promote Finland’s objective of reaching carbon neutrality in 2035 and the realisation of the circular economy. Responsibility perspectives have been taken into account in our goods procurement, such as tax law books, gifts and PR products. For example, physical books and magazines have been replaced with electronic versions and gifts and PR products also include non-material gifts. Responsibility has also been emphasised in the packaging materials and delivery methods of products.
Hansel, the central purchasing body for public administration, pays attention to sustainability objectives in its procurement, for example, through responsible framework agreements and dynamic procurement systems (DPS). Hansel’s joint procurement procedures have been subject to responsibility analyses and marked with responsibility IDs based on environmental, social and economic responsibility taken into account in the procurement. We participate in promoting responsibility through means such as joint procurement processes related to travel.
We promote the central government’s premises strategy and have several ongoing premises projects around Finland. The sustainability report data related to real estate units, such as electricity consumption and waste volumes, is obtained directly from Senate Properties. The previous Green Office agreement was terminated in September 2024.
Metrics and goals
We monitor our successes and develop our operations using the following metrics and goals:
Carbon dioxide emissions (CO2)
| Metric | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2024/2017 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Business travel | 1,513 | 1,779 | 1,980 | 285 | 162 | 885 | 815 | 642 | −58 % |
| Paper consumption | 1,373 | 1,490 | 1,137 | 1,093 | 925 | 887 | 868 | 788 | −43 % |
| Energy consumption | 4,926 | 5,074 | 4,512 | 3,017 | 2,813 | 2,190 | 2,165 | 1,563 | −68 % |
| Waste volume | 42 | 46 | 44 | 34 | 29 | 37 | 40 | 37 | −12 % |
| Total | 7,854 | 8,389 | 7,673 | 4,429 | 3,929 | 3,999 | 3,888 | 3,030 | −61 % |
| Metric | Actual 2020 | Actual 2021 | Actual 2022 | Actual 2023 | Goal 2024 | Actual 2024 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Job satisfaction (VMBaro total index, 1–5) | 3,76 | 3,70 | 3,77 | 3,78 | ≥ 3.7 | 3.60 |
| Employer image and values (VMBaro, 1–5) | 4,08 | 4,03 | 4,08 | 4,04 | ≥4,00 | 3.89 |
Highlights from 2024: We act safely, taking risks into account
In 2024, we allocated resources and took measures to protect our services and ensure their availability.
In particular, the awareness of security risks among personnel plays a key role in combating various security threats. Regularly highlighting topical issues in our internal channels is an efficient and interactive way of maintaining a good safety culture.
Tax Administration employees revise security issues on an online course at least once every two years. In addition to the online course, personnel awareness and skills are maintained through regular security communications and continuous training on phishing attempts.
As a preventive measure to help our customers, we have compiled guidelines for the safe use of the Tax Administration’s e-services and the identification of genuine messages from the Tax Administration on the vero.fi website. One of our preventive approaches significant to the public is that we do not our customers to provide us with their banking IDs or payment card information by email or text messages. The text messages we send also do not contain links. We have also registered text message sender information to a Traficom’s register.