The share of employees with a foreign background in Helsinki’s workforce has reached 15 per cent, with new data showing a strong concentration in health and social services and a widening gap in senior roles, as Finland’s second-generation immigrant population passes 100,000.
Helsinki employed nearly 6,000 workers of foreign background at the end of 2023, according to figures released by the city. The group accounted for 15 per cent of total staff, a rise from recent years and close to their share of the working-age population.
The increase forms part of a wider demographic shift across Finland. Statistics Finland said the number of people born in the country with a foreign background exceeded 100,000 in 2025, reaching 102,183. The figure has doubled over the past decade.
“Second-generation foreign-background residents are still largely young. Nearly 38 per cent are under school age,” said Markus Rapo, senior statistician at Statistics Finland.
In Helsinki, foreign-background staff are unevenly distributed across sectors and roles. The city said one in five employees in health and social services came from a foreign background. The category includes early childhood education staff.
More than half of all foreign-background employees worked in care and healthcare roles at employee level. In some groups, such as cleaning and food services, the share reached 55 per cent.
Representation declines in higher positions. Only one per cent of managers in the city workforce had a foreign background. Among specialists the figure stood at six per cent, rising to just over ten per cent among experts.
The data shows that language background links to career progression. Among managers and specialists, more than half spoke a European language as their mother tongue. Workers with Somali or Middle Eastern and North African language backgrounds were more often in operational roles.
Women form the majority of Helsinki’s workforce and this pattern extends to foreign-background staff. Around four in five workers in this group were women. The city said this reflects broader labour market trends, where foreign-background women face barriers to employment.
Language data shows different patterns between men and women. Among men, around a quarter spoke a language from the Middle East or North Africa. Among women, Russian and Asian languages were more common. The city linked this to recent international recruitment, including hiring care workers from countries such as the Philippines.
Somali speakers form a distinct group within the workforce. Their share among foreign-language staff exceeds their proportion in the working-age population. One in four Somali-speaking employees was born in Finland, and more than half of all Finland-born foreign-background staff in the city spoke Somali.
Across Finland, people with a foreign background made up 11.7 per cent of the population at the end of 2025, or 660,800 individuals. Of these, second-generation residents accounted for over 100,000.
The structure of the population continues to change. Ukrainians became the largest group of foreign citizens in Finland during 2025. At the same time, Russian remained the most common mother tongue among foreign-language speakers, with more than 100,000 people.
Population growth slowed during the year, with the total population increasing by 16,910. Statistics Finland said this marked a decline from the previous year as migration levels fell.
HT