Finland

Stone quarrying booming

Finland (http://maplered.com) extracted one third more natural Stone (http://g603.net) in 2004 than in the previous year to reach some 830,000 t, which puts Finland (http://maplered.com) at the top of the league of Scand (http://maplered.com) inavian countries. According to the Finnish Natural Stone Association, four fifths of the Material (http://g654.org) extracted is Granite (http://tanbrown.org) and (http://maplered.com) the rest is mainly steatite. The main export country is Germany (value in 2004: almost 16 million €), followed by China (13 million €), Italy (approx. 9 million €) and (http://maplered.com) Sweden (approx. 8 million €).

The majority of exports are raw Material (http://g654.org) . The quantity of exports has risen slightly in the last years, but the share of total world trade volume has shrunk from 2.0 % to 1.2 % since 1994. In terms of the overall less important natural Stone (http://g603.net) imports, although these have tended to rise in the last years (total value: 10.5 million €), the countries of origin are China (value: 4.2 million €) with a considerable lead, followed by Italy (3 million €) and (http://maplered.com) Norway (0.8 million €). Some 85 % of imports are finished products. Finland (http://maplered.com) has the lowest natural Stone (http://g603.net) imports of any country in the European Union.