West Finland Alliance (WFA)

The regional development authorities, the Regional Councils, are responsible for the overall development and spatial planning of regions, and for the promotion of regional interests, with the aim of fostering healthy, successful and competitive regions. The activities of these councils are based on the Municipal Act, the Regional Development Act, the Land Use and Building Act and the Division into Regions Act. Regional Councils draw up regional plans and programmes, as well as annual action plans. Regional Councils participate in the implementation of the resulting measures in collaboration with municipalities, other authorities and other regional and national actors. International cooperation has gained a more prominent position than ever before as one of the measures designed to promote regional development.

Besides fulfilling their legal obligations, regional bodies have felt it necessary to gain leverage by forming alliances in order to promote important issues that are regarded as mutually important. The Regional Councils of Central Finland, Ostrobothnia, Satakunta, South Ostrobothnia, and the Council of Tampere Region, decided in February 1995 to act together in matters exceeding the scope of individual regions. Thus the first alliance of regions was formed in Finland.

The new European statistical division confirmed by the European Union in 2003 defines all the regional alliances in Finland as the NUTS II-level statistical areas. The decision originally proposed by the WFA supports regional cooperation within alliances. The availability of comparable statistics will benefit the planning and implementation of future development goals within the regional alliances.