The number of foreign language speakers in Finland has now surpassed Swedish speakers.
THE number of foreign language speakers in Finland has exceeded that of Swedish speakers for the first time, reports Helsingin Sanomat. According to Statistics Finland there are 293,536 foreign language speakers living here. In comparison, there are 290,764 Swedish speakers currently in Finland.
The growth of foreign language speakers in Finland has been a relatively recent phenomenon, with their number having more than doubled in the past six years.
Russian speakers currently make up the largest group of foreign language speakers in Finland, with over 67,000. They are followed by Estonian speakers, whose numbers have doubled since 2008. Furthermore, there are now over 10,000 speakers of Somali, English, Arabic and Kurdish languages living around the country.
James O’Sullivan
