BONJOUR L'ESTONIE

Latest news : week 24 - 2014

Number of unemployed in Estonia falls below 30000 for the first time since recession

The Baltic Course

The number of registered jobless continued to decrease in May 2014 in Estonia and reached 29,388 people by the end of the month, which formed ...

 

Average Estonian immigrant is a 20 something Russian man, who comes here to work

The Baltic Course

At the Migration Forum in Tallinn it was noted that Estonia is not attractive for immigrants, who are looking for high social benefits, rather, people come ...

In search of the true Estonian

The future of being Estonian doesn’t depend solely on demographic trends. Our understanding of the essence of being Estonian is important as well. Martin Ehala, Professor of Literacy Education at the UT Institute of Estonian and General Linguistics, sheds some light on the topic.

Not long ago, as I was visiting London, I spoke to a room full of teachers of Estonian language abroad. I told them that 50-90 percent of the world’s languages will probably become extinct during the 21st century. I followed with a question: if we’d line up all the languages in the world according to vitality, where would the Estonian language end up?

For about half of the listeners, the answer was: somewhere among the bottom 3,000. The online version of the Postimees newspaper conducted a similar gallup a few years ago with the results not being much better. As it turns out, a significant part of our fellow natives is peacefully going on with their lives, all the while thinking that the Estonian language is a lovely thing – but unfortunately too small and thus destined to become extinct.

“Based on the number of people speaking the language, Estonian is among the world’s largest 400, not the smallest 3,000.”

When one takes a look at the level of development of our language objectively, it takes a position among the few hundred most developed language cultures in the world. The Estonian language functions as the national language and one of the official languages of the European Union. Estonia has an Estonian language-based educational system on all levels that meets the international standard, as well as a rich native tongue-based culture (journalism, poetry, prose, TV and radio programs, film). Estonian language-related technology is steadily progressing — creating language interfaces to computer programs, speech synthesis and machine translation.

Kohtla-Järve in N.E. Estonia may go bankrupt

One of the largest towns in Northeast Estonia, Kohtla-Järve, is facing a steep budget crisis, writes Eesti Päevaleht. The town’s municipal leaders say that the budget hole is caused by the fact that residents are leaving the town, moving elsewhere, and individual income tax revenues have dried up.

The financial problems of Kohtla-Järve, Estonia’s fifth largest town, are so big that the town could become bankrupt as a worst-case scenario. One likely option is to lay off municipal staff or ask them to work four-day working weeks.

The town’s council has already asked the city government to draw up a crisis plan. According to the council, the town’s woes were caused by high loan burden and overoptimistic budget and income tax expectations.

According to Deputy Mayor Ljudmila Janchenko who is responsible for financing, the budget deficit could amount to EUR 1.2m by the year-end.

Toomas Hõbemägi

Eesti Post unveil new international name

Eesti Post today unveils its new international name Omniva, which will be used for its logistics solutions and business operations in the Baltic domestic market. The name Eesti Post will be retained for post offices and the mail delivery service, and will be the legal name of the company in Estonia.

This summer Eesti Post will gradually introduce the Omniva trademark in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, illustrating the international character of the logistics company. Omniva will operate all of the company’s modern communication and logistics services.

The internationalisation of the company and enlargement of its domestic market from Estonia to Latvia and Lithuania have driven the need for the new trademark. All subsidiaries in Estonia and abroad will be drawn together under the unifying new brand name. Omniva will provide the logistics services and e-services that have until now been under different brands, like the Post24 automatic parcel machines, ELS courier service, Kirjakeskus mail centre and eArvekeskus e-invoicing centre. The name Eesti Post will be retained for post offices and the mail delivery service, and will be the legal name of the company in Estonia.

Lotte themepark in Estonia to shock parents with steep admission fare

Parents have not been amused to learn that admission to Lottemaa, the Lotte theme park that is being developed in Tahkuranna near Pärnu, will cost EUR 15 for a child older than 3 years and EUR 18 for adults, writes Eesti Päevaleht.

This means that a family with two children would have to fork out EUR 66 plus catering and transport costs. According to the marketing manager Jorgen Sumin, the admission price includes about 100 attractions.

"We did not want to have a system where you need to pay separately for every attraction,” said Sumin. The first themepark passes went on sale this weekend and attracted bookings as far as from Australia. Sumin added the park will be officially opened on July 26 and is attracting interest also abroad, especially in Latvia.

Sumin said that many Latvians think that Lotte is actually a Latvian character and have been surprised to learn that the themepark is being built in Estonia and not in Latvia. Part of the animation work was produced in a Latvian animation studio.

Under current plans, Lottemaa will open at the end of July for a month. In later periods it  will can be used as a training event. The organisers say that they will sell up to 1,000 tickets a day to avoid traffic problems because the park has parking for 600 cars and ten coaches.

Toomas Hõbemägi

Gasoline price in Estonia

Price per gallon of gasoline: $6.73
Rank by most expensive gas: 33
Rank by pain at the pump: 25

The cost of gas in Estonia rose 10 percent since last July, moving the country's price rank up five positions.

Estonians use less gasoline than the global average, but with their relatively low incomes, the fuel bill still takes a toll on family budgets.

The average daily income is $55. It takes 12 percent of a day’s wages to buy a gallon of gas. 

See the gas data visualized.

Deaths from air pollution rise

Four Australians a day are dying because of air pollution, an international report has found, which puts the cost to the country at almost $6 billion a year. The OECD research into the economic costs of air pollution found Australia is one of 14 nations where deaths from poor quality air have increased over recent years.

In Australia's case, 882 people died from ambient air pollution in 2005. By 2010, this had increased to 1483. Only one other OECD member nation, Estonia, had a bigger increase in air pollution-related deaths than Australia.

The lift in deaths has also led to an increase in the number of "life years" lost in Australia to air pollution. The OECD estimates Australians collectively lost 20,631 life years in 2010. The ultimate cost to the country because of air pollution, from increased use of medicines to people too sick to do what they would like, is now estimated to be $6.25 billion.

The Department of Environment Regulation said air quality in Perth was rated "poor" on three days last year. A spokeswoman said the Perth Air Quality Management Plan directly targeted vehicle emissions and smoky wood heaters. The Diesel National Environment Protection Measure also assisted with managing diesel engine emissions.

Associate Professor Ben Mullins of Curtin University's School of Public Health said Perth's air quality was generally good.

Estonia is among the 30 most competitive states in the world

Estonia is on the 30th position in the fresh 2014 global competitiveness report of IMD as compared to the 36th position last year, LETA/Postimees Online reports.

Latvia was on the 35th and Lithuania on the 34th place.

The previous time Estonia was in the top 30 was in 2008 (23rd place) and the highest place in the list was scored in 2006 (19th).

The top list is based on the states' 2013 economic results and polls of company managers than took place in February-March this year as well as background information, altogether 333 indicators.

The top position in the list went to the United States, followed by Switzerland, Singapore, Hong Kong, Sweden, Germany, Canada, the United Arab Emirates, Denmark and Norway. Ukraine is on 49th place.

Check .pdf here

Estonian government approves cohabitation bill regardless of sex

TALLINN - The Estonian government on Thursday approved a controversial cohabitation bill that regulates finance, inheritance, care and visitation rights for cohabiting couples regardless of their sex, Estonian Public Broadcasting (ERR) reported.

The bill sparked heated public debate, during which Estonian religious and conservative campaigners demanded a referendum on the issue. They accused the initiators of the bill were undermining family values, while proponents pointed out that the majority of children in Estonia were already living with single parents or unmarried couples.

The report said that the bill takes into account the position of the Chancellor of Justice Indrek Teder, who said that current laws do not offer enough legal protection to cohabiting couples and that same sex couples were entitled to the protection of the same basic rights. The lack of legal regulation therefore violated the constitution in her opinion.

Cohabitation can be registered at a notary by a couple where at least one party is an Estonian resident, and neither is married or under another valid cohabitation contract. The cohabitation contract will be included in the population register and marital property register.

If approved by the parliament, the bill should enter into force on Jan. 1, 2015.

Economy ministry wants to cancel the sale Tallinn's TV tower

A few months before the new Estonian government came to power, the previous government declared a sales offer of state-owned telecommunications company AS Levira, which administers also the landmark Tallinn TV tower, but the new economy minister Urve Palo intends to stop the sale of Levira, LETA/Eesti Päevaleht writes.

"Yes, I intend to raise the issue of sale of Levira at the cabinet meeting in the near future and make a proposal to stop the sales process," Palo said.

Palo said that there are two reasons for stopping the sale: first, security and second, the symbolic meaning of the TV tower. Eesti Päevaleht wrote that the Security Police has issued an evaluation about selling shares of Levira too.

The 314 metres-high TV tower is the symbol of Estonia regaining independence, which the Soviet army tried to conquer in August 1991. The building was re-opened to public in 2012, after thorough renovations and became a major tourist attraction at once. It had to be open for public for the next five years. If sold, the new owner could close it in 2017.

Levira was formed in 1997, providing broadcasting, media and IT infrastructure services in Estonia, the Baltic states and Nordic states. The Estonian state has a 51% stake in it and French company TDF 49% of shares. The economy ministry announced in February that the state's 51% stake will be sold together with TDF's 49% of shares. Thus the aim of the sales offer is to sell 100% of Levira's shares together.

Every third new company in Estonia is founded by a woman

Around 20,000 new companies a year have been founded in Estonia over the past three years; every third new entrepreneur is a woman and every fifth founder of a new company has had experience with entrepreneurship before, LETA/Public Broadcasting cites a study on new companies compiled by SEB.

43% of the founders of companies are in the 26-35 years age group and half of them have higher education, or they are acquiring it. The key elements for starting a company is personal belief, self-confidence to start and succeed as an entrepreneur.

"The fear of business failure and readiness to enter business in different ages is changing. The profile of people starting with business is becoming wider and starters' knowledge base is becoming more mature. It is not an unimportant fact that every third new company in Estonia today is founded by a woman, which is a very positive trend," said SEB's business innovation leader Mart Maasik.

Second pillar pension funds volume grew by a fifth in Estonia in 2013

In 2013, the asset volume of Estonian second-pillar or mandatory pension funds grew by 291 million euros or by 20%, reaching 1.771 billion euros by the end of 2013, LETA/Postimees Online reports.

In comparison, the volume of voluntary pension funds grew by 9 million euros – from 96 million euros to 105 million euros, Estonian Financial Supervision Authority report indicates.

The total number of unit holders in mandatory pension funds rose by 2,710. The number of unit holders in mandatory pension funds stood at 708,812 as at the end of 2013.

Money in mandatory pension funds continued to migrate from larger management companies to LHV Asset Management in 2013. The market share of Swedbank Investment Funds fell from 42% to 41%, the market share of SEB Asset Management from 23% to 22% and the market share of Danske Capital from 11% to 10%. At the same time, the market share of LHV Asset Management grew from 17% to 19%.

Excessive language requirements may be lifted in Estonia to ease career opportunities for Russians

Estonia's Education Ministry has referred a bill amending the Law on the Language and allowing Russian candidates to fill high posts in the public sector, to other ministries and agencies for approval procedures.

Such candidates would not be required to bring their command of the Estonian language to Level C2 which is the top level in spoken Estonian, the ministry's press service reported on Tuesday. Since no exams are organized to check this particular level, people have no opportunity to demonstrate their skills, it said.

"This situation is unacceptable since candidates are required to do what they actually cannot do," Education and Science Minister Jevgeny Ossinovsky, the only Russian minister in the Estonian government, said, Interfax reports.

"The artificially rigorous requirements which cannot be fulfilled are in obvious contradiction with the principle of equal circulation of the languages," he said. "They constitute one of the reasons why there are so few people in the public sector whose native language is Russian," the minister said.

He said the current situation does not allow people to climb to the top of the career ladder. If the bill is adopted the problem will be solved, he said. However, the bill would give the employer the right to require a level of Estonian language speaking skills which he finds appropriate for the job, although they must not be higher than Level C1.

Estonian electronic voting system vulnerable to attacks

International research team finds insecure operational procedures and fundamental weaknesses in Estonian Internet voting system.

The electronic voting system that has been used in Estonia since 2005 cannot guarantee fair elections because of fundamental security weaknesses and poor operational procedures, according to an international team of security and Internet voting researchers.

The analysis performed by the team's members, some of whom acted as observers during 2013 local elections in Estonia, revealed that sophisticated attackers, like those employed by nation states, could easily compromise the integrity of the country's Internet voting system and influence the election outcome, often without a trace.

The team chose to analyze the Estonian system because Estonia has one of the highest rates of Internet voting participation in the world -- over 21 percent of the total number of votes during the last local election were cast through the electronic voting system.

During their observation of the local elections and by later watching the procedural videos released by the Estonian election authority, the researchers identified a large number of poor security practices that ranged from election officials inputting sensitive passwords and PINs while being filmed to system administrators downloading critical applications over insecure connections and using personal computers to deploy servers and build the client software distributed to voters.

Tallinn Car Museum opens for visitors

The collection of Tallinn Car Museum boasts 40 vehicles, ranging from Soviet manufactured cars to reputable international models, and which are now exhibited for all viewers, Tallinn Tourism Board said in a statement, reports LETA.

The display features such classics as Rambler, Packard One-Eighty, Mercedes-Benz 300 W112 and many others. The museum visitors get to learn about the history of these exhibits with the oldest car on display dating back as far as 1931. The museum also includes a conservation workshop and an area where visitors can browse and purchase miniature model cars.

The museum is open from May 1 until September 30, and if the weather holds, the doors will be open until the end of October. Located near Tallinn Zoo, the museum is accessible by multiple public transport routes.

Estonia's 50 best restaurants in 2014 are announced

The 50 best restaurants of 2014 were announced in Tallink Spa & Conference Hotel last week. Most of the highest ranking restaurants are located in Tallinn, but this year you may also find restaurants from Haapsalu, Viljandi and Raplamaa among the best, Tallinn Tourism Board said in a statement, informs LETA.

"Altogether, 12 new restaurants made it onto the list. The latest developments in the gastronomy world have brought about a new requirement. A good restaurant must also be relevant. The eateries that lost their placing did not become worse, but gave way to more active and attractive ones. There are over 1300 eating establishments in Estonia. This is a very large number and competition is tight," said Aivar Hanson, manager of the program Flavors of Estonia, and who also compiled this year's list.

The best restaurants have been chosen by key employees of restaurants. Now an international jury will get to work assessing the restaurants by their own visiting experience and in the autumn, the restaurants on the list will be given placings.

Both the food as well as the environment of the restaurants have become more diverse. This year’s additions include another farm restaurant, a restaurant in a seaside villa and a chameleon restaurant that changes its theme three times a day... What else could this small country surprise us with?

The current table is in alphabetical order. The rankings to be announced in October.

Flavors of Estonia is a program started in 2008, which supports the development of culinary skills and promotes Estonia as a country with excellent food.

In 2013, Estonian population declined by 4,355 persons

According to the revised data of Statistics Estonia, 1,315,819 persons lived in Estonia on 1 January 2014. In 2013 the population declined by 4,355 persons (0.3%). Increased immigration has reduced the impact of emigration on population decline. However, the falling number of births means that natural increase has a bigger role in population decline.

The population decreased by 2,614 persons due to external migration and by 1,741 persons due to negative natural increase. Natural increase in 2013 was –1,740 (13,575 persons were born and 15,316 persons died). Net migration was also negative at –2,614 (there were 4,110 immigrants and 6,724 emigrants).

Natural increase has a growing impact on processes related to population decline. The number of births has fallen rapidly in the last three years. In 2013, there were over 2,000 births less than in 2010. The number of deaths decreased over the last decade, resulting in higher life expectancy. However, in the last three years, the number of deaths has stabilised. This means that natural increase in Estonia is negative mainly due to the decreasing number of births.

Number of train passengers in Estonia grew by 50% in April

The Estonian state-owned passenger train operator Elron announced that over 460,000 trips by train were made in April 2014 with Elron's trains, and the number of trips grew by nearly 50% as compared to last April, LETA/Postimees Online reports.

"In April, we posted again a record result of recent years regarding the number of passengers; this century, the April train passenger numbers have been comparable to this year's numbers only in the years 2000 and 2004," said Elron's board chairman Andrus Ossip.

"According to Statistics Estonia, Estonian passenger train traffic passenger number is overcoming the falling trend that started in 2007 and thus we are pretty certain that we will achieve our aim – this year, over 5.5 million people will travel by train in Estonia," he added.

Elron's ticket fee in April reached 735,000 euros, 55% more than in April last year. The Estonian state-owned Elron, formerly called Elektriraudtee, operates starting this year both electric commuter trains in Tallinn and its vicinity and intercity diesel trains that were formerly operated by Edelaraudtee.

Train travel becomes more expensive in Estonia as transit contracts

Due to the Russian transit business leaving Estonia, train passengers whose trips were so far subsidized from revenues of cargo transport will have to start paying a higher price for their tickets, LETA/Postimees writes.

In autumn the moment will arrive when the decision to raise ticket prices will have to be made. It also has to be decided whether to raise the prices in autumn or next year, said passenger train operator Elron board chairman Andrus Ossip. "In longer-term perspective it means that a train ticket will cost as much as a bus ticket does," he said.

Postimees said that the price increase could amount to 10-20%.

Elron, a third of whose expenditures go to infrastructure fees now, has operated diesel trains since the start of this year and says that it needs till autumn to analyze its financing principles. Ossip said though that for example the Tapa-Tartu and Tapa-Narva railway sections need to be renovated otherwise train speed will have to be reduced there.

"It is not possible for us to guess what happens when cargo transport decreases. It is important for us that trains ride and ride fast," said Ossip. "The increase in the number of passengers has to help cover the increasing costs – we count on 5.5 million and more passengers a year – or change of ticket prices. The correct way would be to use combined measures, where both ticket price and infrastructure subsidies would increase," he said.

Cargo ships stop using Estonia as flag state

There are no big cargo ships sailing under the Estonian flag anymore after Eesti Merelaevandus (Estonian Shipping Co)-owned mixed cargo-container ship Kurkse was deleted from the ship registry in February 2014 and its sister ship Kalana on April 16, LETA/Postimees writes.

"There are no real cargo ships sailing under the Estonian flag anymore," state Waterways Board department head Tarmo Ots.

International shipping group Tschudi-owned Eesti Merelaevandus sold both ships to a shipping company partly owned by Estonians who will most likely register them under the flag of Saint Vincent. "We sold the ships since the bank did not agree to refinance a loan," the company's board member Jaan Kalmus explained. "Our remaining ships sail under the flag of the Isle of Man since Estonian tax politics would render us uncompetitive as compared to other shippers."

While all Baltic Sea states grant social and income tax concessions to wages of seamen of their shipping companies, Estonian shipping companies pay full payroll taxes which increases the payroll cost by a fifth on account of income tax and by social tax another third. While the social tax is later refunded, it happens only a year later. Shipping companies also say that Estonia's aliens' policy makes it hard for shipping companies to hire temporary workforce from abroad when they need to.