Overview and targets 

Åland has a long tradition of approaching sustainable development in a national context, efforts that in 2016 resulted in the establishment of the “Everyone Can Flourish Vision” with its seven strategic goals and the multi-stakeholder network bärkraft.ax. The Åland goals seek, of course, to contribute to the implementation of the SDGs and Åland’s broader Development and Sustainability Agenda.

Bärkraft (2016) Development and sustainability agenda for Åland. The vision and the seven strategic development goals. Available at: https://www.barkraft.ax/sites/default/files/attachments/page/media/development-and-sustainability-agenda-for-aland-2017-03-01.pdf

The work has earned the government international recognition. As a measure of Åland’s development and sustainability strategy, Åland, as the only Nordic actor, was awarded the EU Prize for Sustainable Development in 2019 in the category “Public bodies with less than 100,000 inhabitants”.

 

Åland aims to reduce carbon dioxide emissions and achieve climate neutrality by 2035 but has consistently paid close attention to the importance of social sustainability. The autonomous region’s sustainability goals are guided by the vision of ”blomstrande människor” (flourishing people), where everyone can thrive in a viable society, while ensuring everyone’s well-being. Annual reports on the vision’s progress have been published for the past five years.  To extend its commitment to inclusion and leaving no one behind, the Åland vision is also available as an audio version on the bärkraft.ax webpage.

Governance and multilevel coordination 

Åland’s development and sustainability agenda, including its seven strategic goals, is implemented in the form of a ‘social contract’ that all sectors on Åland have collectively drawn up and support. The parliament has overall responsibility for the development and sustainability agenda, while the government is responsible for its implementation.

 

As of 2022, the Development and Sustainability Council (Utvecklings- och hållbarhetsråd), established in 2016, is appointed by the government, except for representatives from civil society and municipalities, who are chosen by their respective network groups within the sustaunability network, and the Ministry for Culture (kulturdelegationen) which appoints one representative. Permanent members of the council include the Head of Government together with the Deputy Head of Government and the Head of Administration and Development. The Council consist of leaders from all sectors and always has 9–14 members.  A Secretary General is appointed and is expected to work directly with the implementation of the Development and Sustainability Agenda for Åland, meaning the realisation of the vision and the seven strategic development goals.

 

The rest of the network is an independent forum of other stakeholders, called Medaktörerna, which works in parallel with the council. These ‘co-actors’ represent all organisations and individuals on Åland that wish to participate in the work.

National implementation of the 2030 Agenda 

Every year since 2016, Åland has published status reports on sustainable development. The report for 2022 highlights Åland’s work to protect the environment, recognising for instance that the level of fertilisers use has not fallen by any significant degree in recent years and is impacting the agricultural sector. At the same time, Åland wishes to attract more people to come and live and work on the islands, so a balance between existing ecosystems and biological diversity must be struck. A step in this direction was the commissioning of the wind farm in Långnabba, Eckerö in the spring of 2022, increasing Åland's renewable energy capacity from approx. 20% to approx. 65%.

There are additional action programmes called ‘färdplaner’ which are updated annually in order to achieve the seven strategic development goals and progress on these can be viewed online. In 2022, specific initiatives focused, for instance, on identifying five new land cap species (part of Åland’s 4^th strategic goal) and efforts to enhance sustainable business travel (part of the 7^th goal - Sustainable consumption and production). In addition to these measures work is being done all fo the time on a small and large scale by organisations and private individuals.

In September 2022, the Working Group for Co-ordination and Reporting (arbetsgruppen för koordinering och rapportering), which consists of the individuals responsible for implementing the goals (målansvariga) in the Development and Sustainability Council, presented a proposal to the government to strengthen its sustainability efforts and ambitions for green transition with resources from the EU. Pointing to examples from Finland and Sweden, which have initiated significant programmes on the circular economy as well as research and innovation, Åland has the potential to further target its work. The proposal was backed by stakeholders from the public, private and civil society sectors as well as the sustainability network.

The bärkraft.ax network also actively works with stakeholder engagement internationally, aiming to share knowledge about the approaches to sustainability work that has been successfully implemented. In related endeavours, Åland presented its sustainability model to the Finnish National Commission on Sustainable Development led by the Prime Minister’s Office and shared reflections on Åland’s experiences and input to the implementation of Finland’s new national action plan on sustainability (2022-2030).

https://www.barkraft.ax/nyheter/aland-delar-sina-erfarenheter-finlands-kommission-hallbar-utveckling

  Åland also spoke at the Stockholm+50 conference in June 2022. 

Åland has a population of 30,000 in 16 municipalities. Åland recognises that the municipal sector is essential to the realisation of its development and sustainability agenda, which is to become a sustainable society by 2051 and for the seven strategic goals to be realised by 2030.

As part of bärkraft.ax, Åland has a network for sustainable municipalities. The group’s main purpose is to promote, strengthen and unite the municipalities in local sustainability efforts contributing to the 2030 Agenda. This includes exchanging experiences and ideas, emphasising what the municipalities can learn from each other, finding common synergies and working towards the goals together efficiently and using resources effectively. The group is led by two chairpersons from different municipalities and meets twice a year. The chair rotates once a year.  

The bärkraft.ax network remains the main co-ordinator of all Agenda 2030 activities and broader sustainability work engaging the public sector, the business community, associations, and the educational sector. The members also work in smaller network groups focusing on specific sectors (private, civil society) with their own initiatives.

The network’s extensive information portal includes an activity calendar for different seminars and events for information sharing, and a media library with downloadable educational and information material. There are also regularly updated roadmaps outlining initiatives taken and to be taken by members of the network to implement the Åland agenda. Refer to the section on implementation for an overview of the network’s recent activities and outreach.

Åland is not included as a separate country in the Sustainable Development Report Index or other large international comparisons. Nevertheless, in order to achieve the seven strategic development goals by 2030, 42 sub-goals and 24 key performance indicators have been identified and show the most important measures that the Åland community needs to adopt alongside the ‘färdplaner’ roadmaps.

The strategic development goals were outlined by analysis groups based on proposals submitted by a panel consisting of 59 experts. Following the same time horizon towards 2030, Åland’s progress is regularly measured using 24 indicators. The working group for co-ordination and reporting (a unit within the bärkraft-network) is responsible for following up the work on the goals and reporting on progress toward Åland’s targets, and the data is included in the status reports (published since 2016 by the Development and Sustainability Council), most recently in 2022. The description of each goal and selected targets and indicators can be found at https://www.barkraft.ax/mal-2030/mal-1. The overview also includes the actions individuals can take in their daily lives to contribute to the goal.

The bärkraft.ax network has also recently carried out an awareness and attitude survey linked to the sustainability agenda and Åland’s “flourishing people” vision. The survey shows that 76% of the population is aware of the development and sustainability agenda and the vision, that this is associated with mostly positive and rational attributes, and that 69% of the population would like to live more sustainably. In parallel, Åland’s statistics bureau, ASUB, is currently collating data about the “flourishing people” vision for the first time based on a method of quantification devised at Harvard University. This method includes six areas that measure the individual’s opportunities and the resources needed to flourish, which are: Satisfaction with life, mental and physical health; meaningfulness; character traits; social relations; and financial security.