How do we make the right predictions for the future of work?

The Nordic labour markets are doing well. Several of the countries are seeing record employment rates. Meanwhile, there are major changes to how and where jobs are being performed. Global trends like digitalisation and climate change mean new professions and skills are needed. How do we future-proof our education programmes? 

When Nordic civil servants from ministries of labour and other authorities hold their biannual meetings, one of the items on the agenda is to assess key performance figures for each country. The latest such meeting was held in Akureyri in North-East Iceland. 

“Employment numbers have just passed three million people. Never before have so many people worked in Denmark,” said the Danish representative.

“We have practically no unemployment in the Faroe Islands,” added the Torshavn representative. 

But there were also signs that the economic peak had already passed.

“Employment has stopped rising, but there is still low unemployment in Norway.”

“Sweden’s employment figures fell and unemployment rose last month.” 

Our visit to North-Eastern Iceland, home to 30,000 people – 20,000 of whom live in Akureyri – left us with many new impressions. In my story from there, I try to show how many-faceted the local labour market is and how important entrepreneurship has become. The quote that stays with me came from Rögvaldur Gudmundsson, head of the Association of Municipalities in Northeast Iceland:

“We asked: What do we do after 5 pm?”

Because creating new jobs is not enough. People need to want to live where jobs are created. Children and adults must have the chance to do sports, experience art and music, go to restaurants and shop – all the things that give life meaning.

Exactly how small and isolated societies can create sustainable jobs is the focus of planned research. One research project, SunRem, has chosen Dalvik and Husavik near Akureyri and other places in Norway, Sweden and Åland as examples of such societies.

A few weeks ago, I participated during a kickoff for SunRem and four other research programmes supported by NordForsk. Lithuania also participates in two of the projects, and the 30-plus researchers therefore met in Vilnius. This made me wonder what the Nordic countries do to adapt their education programmes to the needs of the future. 

So Fayme Alm spoke to the Swedish National Agency for Education and the National Agency for Higher Vocational Education, while Line Scheistrøen visited the Vocational School in Oslo.

It is clear that we need more than the smart brains of IT technicians and computer programmers in the future. We need smart hands too.

This was also the theme for one of the debates during the Nordic Council session in Oslo. Veronika Honkasalo from the Nordic Green Left Alliance quoted analyses that warn of a shortfall of hundreds of thousands of vocational experts in the Nordics within 10 to 15 years.

The Nordic Council is therefore asking the Nordic Council of Ministers to establish a commission for vocational training. 

This year's session was marked by the dramatic escalation of the conflict between Palestinians and Israel. For the past year and a half, the war has also been raging in Ukraine. Next year, the Nordic countries will celebrate 70 years with a common labour market, but it has also been significantly influenced by the influx of labour from the Baltics, Poland, and most recently, Ukraine.

But the first wave of Estonians arriving in Finland are now going back home, writes Bengt Östling, while Rólant Dam Waag writes about how the Faroe Islands’ economy can be hit by a fish import ban from Russia. Many see a connection between the Russian threat and the fact that the Faroes have signalled that a 50-year-old fishing agreement with Russia might not be renewed.

We also have a story from Marie Preisler about new working environment legislation in Greenland, Kerstin Ahlberg's analysis of a new ruling from the EU Court on whether cabin crew are victims of gender discrimination because they get lower allowances than pilots, and we congratulate Renewcell for winning this year's Nordic Council Environment Prize.

Last but not least: Hallgrímur Indriðason has interviewed Iceland's Minister of Social Affairs, Labour and Nordic Cooperation who has led the Icelandic Presidency of the Nordic Council of Ministers in 2023. He is a former environment minister and before that a climate activist, so it is no surprise that climate change and the environment have been important themes during his tenure.

“We have a special emphasis on a fair green transition which is covered in that plan, but we’re taking it to a higher level. We are preparing for a summit at the start of December where we use the Nordic labour market model as a role model. We are gathering representatives from everyone; the labour unions, the employers and the governments,” he says.