Archives
Electric Dreams
Electric cars in Norway have risen to a record 54% market share, making this Nordic country the first in the world where the sale of electric cars has outstripped any other type for a full year. It’s quite a milestone for January 2021 and was forecast in a Nordic Horizons event just over two years ago. There’s nothing mystical about Norway’s electric car success – using taxes and giving leccie cars traffic priority have been big factors. Read more about the latest news via https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/jan/05/electric-cars-record-market-share-norway. Watch the short video about Norway’s electric car strategy in the Nordic Horizons clip below. It features Petter Haugneland, Communications Director, Norwegian Electric Vehicle Association. Vimeo V...Read More
Nordic Horizons guide to Celtic Connections 2020
So many fabulous Nordic performers are appearing at Celtic Connections in January 2020, it seemed a good idea to list them. Each year, Scotland’s largest traditional music festival presents a “showcase Scotland” partnership with a different nation. This year’s it’s Finland … so there are loads of performances featuring Finnish artists playing with top stars of the Scottish Trad Music scene. Get booking folks. Norway Jan 19th 7.30pm Mitchell Theatre Scots fiddler Sarah-Jane Summers is based in Norway, and is reprising Owerset, her New Voices commission that’s themed around Scots and Gaelic words originating in Old Norse. It features a six-piece ensemble on fiddles, trumpet, accordion, guitars and double bass. Sarah-Jane is playing with the fabulous Scots pianist, flautist and composer Hamis...Read More
Have the Finns Ended Homelessness?
Have the Finns Ended Homelessness? – Event Details Have the Finns ended homelessness? ..and can Scots follow their lead? Speaker – Juha Kaakinen CEO of the Y-Foundation in Helsinki Venue – Grassmarket Community Centre 86 Candlemaker Row, Edinburgh EH1 2QA Tuesday 18 September Time 6-8pm The Finns have come up with a radical approach to tackling homelessness. They give homeless people houses without having to engage with addiction or mental health services first. Housing First is a national strategy to eradicate homelessness that’s been running in Finland since 2008. It’s built on cooperation between the government, local municipalities and NGOs and the simple notion that people can tackle social and emotional problems better if they have a secure home. Juha Kaakinen is the CEO ...Read More
On Thin Ice – is the Arctic safe?
Russia’s first floating nuclear power plant has left Murmansk for its 4700 kms trip to a remote Siberian port – according to Arctic Today. News agencies suggest China is building another 20 floating nuclear rigs. Meanwhile Donald Trump didn’t managed to buy Greenland but he can still wreak Arctic eco-havoc in Alaska. A new 200 kms motorway, a copper mine & oilfield have been proposed in the remote Brooks Range foothills – and it seems there’s little or nothing small, surrounding Arctic states can do about these developments. In 2011, Nordic Horizons organised a Festival of Politics debate about the safety of the High North, after Statoil (now Equinor) announced that its latest North Sea oil discovery (Aldous Major South) was the biggest Norwegian find in 20 year...Read More
If trees grow along Norway’s fjords why not in Highland glens?
It seems some folk are sceptical about how well trees would grow in the Highlands or on the fifth of Scotland’s landmass currently covered with grouse moors. There’s wind and rain and the soil is pretty degraded. So maybe the glens are just too barren for any other land use? On no, they’re not. Watch this excellent presentation including a 6 min video by Scots/Norway expert Duncan Halley of the Norwegian Institute of Nature Research, speaking at the Nordic Horizons event “Nurturing Nature” a few years ago. Then decide if Scotland is ready for a Norwegian-style reforestation programme with a wider variety of species – and a much, much wider variety of landowners. If you’d like to know more, here’s a brilliant article by Rewilding Britain with ...Read More
Is the Future Arctic?
Is the Future Arctic? The Arctic Circle Forum, a roaming regional offshoot of the annual Arctic Circle Assembly, came to Scotland in November 2017 and Nordic Horizons ran a packed out Fringe event, with a great panel of speakers from across the Arctic. Our panellists were – Tukumminnguaq Nykjaer Olsen, a young student and campaigner from Greenland, who won this 2017 Arctic Innovation prize. Scots-born Rachael Johnstone, Professor of Law, Arctic Oil and Gas Studies at Greenland University Jon Baldvin Hannibalsson, Iceland’s former Foreign Minister, who took Iceland into EFTA and was the first to recognise the sovereignty of the Baltic states Rune Rafaelson, mayor of Sør-Varanger, Norway’s most northerly municipality, former Director of the Barents Secretariat and an expert on oi...Read More
Vimeo Videos
Videos from Nordic Horizon events Sólveig Anna Jónsdóttir Interview from Nordic Horizons on Vimeo. Brexit, Scotland and the EEA from Nordic Horizons on Vimeo. Electric Dreams – Norway and the future of electric cars from Nordic Horizons on Vimeo. Is the Future Arctic? from Nordic Horizons on Vimeo.
Why do Nordic countries have three times more trade union members than Scotland?
Nordic Workplace Democracy This event on 20th February 2019 marked a rare trip outside Edinburgh for Nordic Horizons. Hosted by the University of Glasgow and introduced by Professor Chris Chapman, Director of Policy Scotland, University of Glasgow, the session focused on Nordic workplace democracy and was well attended by trade union activists and officials as well as the usual mix of students, researchers and policy officers. So why do Nordic countries generally have three times more union members than Scotland? Obviously, a societal framework of mutual respect, equity, negotiation and compromise helps trade unions thrive, in contrast to the casualised UK where unions have never recovered from the Thatcher period, and find it hard to win collective bargaining rights over wages in Britain’...Read More